Three-dimensional quantification of soil hydraulic properties using X-ray Computed Tomography and image-based modeling

Tracy, Saoirse R.; Daly, Keith R.; Sturrock, Craig J.; Mooney, Sacha J.; Crout, Neil M.J.; Roose, Tiina

doi:10.1002/2014WR016020

Authors

Saoirse R. Tracy

Keith R. Daly

Dr CRAIG STURROCK craig.sturrock@nottingham.ac.uk
Principal Research Fellow

SACHA MOONEY sacha.mooney@nottingham.ac.uk
Professor of Soil Physics

NEIL CROUT neil.crout@nottingham.ac.uk
Interim Pro-Vice Chancellor For Research & Knowledge Exchange

Tiina Roose

Abstract

We demonstrate the application of a high-resolution X-ray Computed Tomography (CT) method to quantify water distribution in soil pores under successive reductive drying. We focus on the wet end of the water release characteristic (WRC) (0 to ?75 kPa) to investigate changes in soil water distribution in contrasting soil textures (sand and clay) and structures (sieved and field structured) and to determine the impact of soil structure on hydraulic behavior. The 3-D structure of each soil was obtained from the CT images (at a 10 ?m resolution). Stokes equations for flow were solved computationally for each measured structure to estimate hydraulic conductivity. The simulated values obtained compared extremely well with the measured saturated hydraulic conductivity values. By considering different sample sizes we were able to identify the smallest possible representative sample size which is required to determine a globally valid hydraulic conductivity.

Citation

Tracy, S. R., Daly, K. R., Sturrock, C. J., Mooney, S. J., Crout, N. M., & Roose, T. (2015). Three-dimensional quantification of soil hydraulic properties using X-ray Computed Tomography and image-based modeling. Water Resources Research, 51(2), 1006-1022. https://doi.org/10.1002/2014WR016020

Journal Article Type	Article
Acceptance Date	Jan 6, 2015
Online Publication Date	Feb 19, 2015
Publication Date	2015-02
Deposit Date	Mar 9, 2017
Publicly Available Date	Mar 9, 2017
Journal	Water Resources Research
Print ISSN	0043-1397
Electronic ISSN	1944-7973
Publisher	American Geophysical Union
Peer Reviewed	Peer Reviewed
Volume	51
Issue	2
Pages	1006-1022
DOI	https://doi.org/10.1002/2014WR016020
Public URL	https://nottingham-repository.worktribe.com/output/985264
Publisher URL	http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2014WR016020/abstract