Selection of the Samples for Laboratory Analysis

Usually, spectra are obtained for all the soil samples available, but only a subset of these samples are sent to the laboratory for chemical and physical analysis. The reason is that spectra are fast and cheap to retrieve, while a single soil analysis (e.g. for soil clay) is relatively slow, and significantly more costly, to obtain. One must select a ‘representative’ subset of soil samples to be sent to the laboratory (Daszykowski et al. 2002).