A Review of Soil Organic Matter and Its Research Methods

Soil organic matter is a very important part of forest ecosystem productivity,and is also a very important tache of biological cycling in forest ecosystem.The sources of soil organic matter and its relationship with soil fertility were analyzed.And the history,problems and research progress of analysis methods of soil organic matter were also reviewed.Soil organic matter was directly or indirectly affected by forest litter,soil biological properties and environmental conditions.Soil organic matter has close connections with soil physical,chemical and biological properties.Many scholars had researched soil organic matter property with some advanced technology,i.e.infrared reflectance spectroscopy,nuclear magnetic resonance,stable carbon isotopes.Due to the complicated structure of soil organic matter,many of its properties were not clear to us.To understand these properties,and its structure,function in forest ecosystem,we should deeply research the structure,function and decomposition process of soil organic matter connected with biological cycling,and these influences on changes of forest ecosystem.