CV

Soil Compaction and Plant Biodiversity in Green Spaces Along Dublin’s Urbanisation Gradient — CV

In urban environmental studies, the primary quality of soil investigated is soil sealing, or how much of the soil surface is covered by roads and buildings in any given location. While deciding on a project topic for Laidlaw, it struck me how much disconnect there is between ecological and urban planning research specifically on the subject of soil structure and composition. Soil health, or the holistic study of soil qualities and services, is a relatively new field of study focused primarily on agricultural settings. However, with the growing attention to urban green spaces and small-scale biodiversity initiatives, there needs to be more research into the role of soil in the productivity of urban green spaces. A good way to think about it is that soil is the foundation, literally and figuratively, of all ecosystems. Soil functions as both a bank of macro- and micro-nutrients like carbon, nitrogen, and potassium, and as a behind-the-scenes manager of services critical to plant, animal, and fungal life. Without taking the intricacies of soil structures and ecosystems into account, one can never get a complete and accurate picture of the functions of an ecosystem. My project aimed to find a correlation between soil compaction, plant biodiversity, and urbanisation to bridge the gap between urban planning and soil science knowledge.