All About the Web of Virtual Soils

Why Virtual Soils?

Soils are all around us. Whether we're in the city, or in the countryside there is soil somewhere near to us. In planters or parks, fields or forests. When teaching, or learning about soil finding it isn't the problem, the problem is accessing the diversity. As soil formation is impacted by the five soil formation factors Climate, Organisms, Relief, Parent Material, and Time (ClORPT), and these factors vary on the scale of landscapes. This leads to soils varying on the scale of landscapes, which therefore necessitates the need for a varity of tools to communicate about the diversity of soils.

An emerging technology that could help to build soils science skills in the next generation of foresters, farmers, policy makers, and land managers is that of 3D-Gaussian splats which allow for detailed reconstructions of real-world environments and landscapes!

3D-Gaussian splats can be viewed today on the web (on virtualsoils.ca) or someday as part of a PC-VR learning experience!

If you want to get in contact about the Virtual Soils project please email me at amy.wells@virtualsoils.ca!