(It's a ...) Micro World (... after all): Terra Preta

Monday, April 21, 2008

Terra Preta

The terra preta are some seriously fertile soils in the Amazon Basin. They are a man-made agricultural wonder, made even more amazing by the fact that these soils were created about 9 to 10 thousand years ago.

There is a great BBC documentary called The Secret of El Dorado which discusses the terra preta soils. If you can find the video online, via YouTube or Google Video, it's worth the watch.

Another amazing thing is that we have no idea how they actually did it. Todays scientists are trying to replicate the terra preta using biochar.

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Who is this joker?

Thomas Joseph
Professionally I am a bug hunter (aka microbiologist) and a gene jockey (aka molecular biologist). I started my career as a med tech, but now I'm a research scientist who studies environmental microbiology. When I'm not answering scientific questions about the roles that microbes play on climate change and/or water and soil quality, I'm an amateur astronomer and play racquetball. I'm also a sports nut, though my liking of both the NY Metropolitans (baseball) and NY Jets (football) tests my devotion to these sports on a continual basis. Fortunately, I'm also an OU alumnus (PhD, Microbiology) and we usually have a pretty good football team. Boomer Sooner!

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