Nonlinear and scaling spatial properties of soil geochemical element contents

The present study aimed at investigating whether a nonlinear and scaling ap proach is suitable for statistically characterizing the spatial variability of soil geochemical element contents at field conditions. Spatial distribu tions of 20 soil geochemical elements' contents in an agricultural field so il were investigated. Two indicators of nonlinear scaling were employed, em pirical probability distribution functions (pdfs) and structure functions. For the pdfs, a trend was discovered with major elements naturally occurrin g in the soil being hyperbolic and minor trace elements being close to Gaus sian, Further, fertilizer management was found to modify the behavior of re lated elements. The structure functions were generally nonscaling for major elements and scaling for minor elements, however, without any noticeable e ffect of fertilizer application. The scaling was of both monoaffine and mul tiaffine type. This suggests that the random cascade models recently used w ithin geophysics may be useful also for geochemical element variability in soil.