Forest management to date has been based on a better understanding of aboveground than belowground processes, and as a result, the important functions of forest soils are frequently overlooked. Tree roots and other life in forest soils are essential for healthy and productive forests and provide valuable ecosystem services, including supplying water and nutrients to trees; providing structure to support trees and prevent soil erosion; purifying surface and groundwater; sequestering carbon from the atmosphere; and serving as habitat for a variety of soil organisms.
The Rhizotron is a major tool in helping to improve the understanding of belowground forest processes. Located at the Forestry Sciences Laboratory in Houghton, MI, the facility is an underground tunnel containing 24 windows that look out into regional forest soils. As one of only two of its kind located in a northern forest ecosystem, it provides researchers the ability to observe and monitor belowground ecological processes, including activities that occur in the chemically active zone near roots, without causing disturbance to the soil or soil organisms.
The Rhizotron enables Northern Research Station scientists and collaborators to better understand the environmental controls and management impacts on belowground processes by providing a research facility that enables repeated, non-destructive access to forest soil as it really is in nature. The facility allows for research on a broad-range of topics, such as carbon cycling in northern forests, rates of root growth and death, and the interrelationships of soil organisms.
- Erik Lilleskov, Northern Research Station Research Ecologist
- Lynette Potvin, Northern Research Station Ecologist
- Michigan Tech University School of Forest Resources and Environmental Science (SFRES)
Last Modified: 04/11/2011