The Critical State of Soil: Microbial Interactions in Soil Structure with John Crawford

Finding Genius Podcast

Richard Jacobs

Health, Extracellularvesicles, Crisprcas9, 3dbioprinting, Medicine, Cancer, Health & Fitness, Biotech, Bioscience, Microbiome, Ketogenicdiets

4.4 • 1K Ratings

🗓️ 17 March 2021

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

A handful of soil really is its own universe. In fact, the mathematical properties that make for galaxy clustering is similar to the physics and biology behind the clustering of soil. So is there a big bang theory for soil? Listen in as Professor John Crawford addresses these big questions for soil-plant-microbe interactions.

This conversation explores

How fractal geometry applies to soil properties and why that's significant,
Why the soil-plant relationship is dependent on soil's ability to allow oxygen and water to interact in a specific way,
How soil microbes organize structure through a feedback loop that includes a "glue," and
What these properties have to do with soil health management, carbon sequestration, climate change, better agriculture, and water retention.

John Crawford is a professor in Strategy and Technology Management at the University of Glasgow. He's studied soil for over 30 years, but actually began his career in astrophysics, and it shows.

He gives listeners a fascinating lesson in the organizational physics of galaxies and how he brought that expansive understanding to soil structure. Furthermore, he explains why this is worthy of close scrutiny, namely its ability to support terrestrial life. He comments that, "if soil is good at one thing . . . it's that it allows air and water to mix over a very broad range of environmental conditions." He gives a fascinating description for how it does so through a maximized interface of microbes, oxygen, carbon, and water with a biological glue to hold it together.

He gets even more specific for how fungi and bacteria practice a critical job share of interactions that benefit all organisms involved. In fact, he adds that "it's probably more accurate to think about soil, as an organism, as a composite organism." He gives specific ways readers can understand these interactions through relaying classic and current studies and describes the direction his research his heading, including toward understanding how soil retains and releases carbon in different situations, how soil-plant relationships work and can benefit from intervention, and how water management can be improved through soil structures.

Listen in to hear more about the fascinating universe under our feet.

For more about his work, see his page at the University of Glasgow.

Episode also available on Apple Podcasts: apple.co/30PvU9C

Transcript

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0:00.0	Forget frequently asked questions, common sense, common knowledge, or Google, how about advice from a real genius?
0:07.0	95% of people in any profession are good enough to be qualified in license.
0:12.0	5% go above and beyond.
0:14.0	They become very good at what they do, but only 0.1% are real geniuses.
0:19.0	Richard Jacobs has made his life's mission to find them for you.
0:23.0	He hunts down and interviews geniuses in every field.
0:26.0	The sleep science, cancer, stem cells, ketogenic diets, and more.
0:30.0	Here come the geniuses. This is the Finding Genius Podcast.
0:34.0	The Richard Jacobs.
0:38.0	Quick note before we begin. The Finding Genius Foundation, as part of the Finding Genius Podcast, has recently completed a book about understanding viruses.
0:47.0	So the creation of this book was to interview 100 virologists, ask them a lot of deep difficult questions, take the most difficult questions, and then re-interview the top 25 or so, and ask them the hardest questions I could think of.
1:01.0	And we compile that all into a book. So you'll see question and four or five experts answers.
1:06.0	Question four or five experts answers. There's about 30 questions in the book. I think it's a great read for the layperson and for the researcher.
1:13.0	Talks about a lot of speculation in the world of viruses, such as, are they alive or not? And why is it important?
1:19.0	White of viruses go latent or hidden or uneffective or sit in a person or an animal or another creature for weeks, months, years, and then suddenly become virulent and affect that person.
1:30.0	So there's a lot of really provocative questions in the book. It's now on Amazon.
1:34.0	So if you go to Amazon and type in Finding Genius, you'll see the book on viruses. It's also on Kindle.
1:39.0	The audible version is in production and should be ready in approximately a month.
1:43.0	But if you want to go and order it now, you can do so again by going to Amazon or Kindle or go to FindingGeniusFoundation.org and go to publications.
1:52.0	There's an opportunity as well to get the transcripts of all the interviews and to hear the original interviews themselves.
1:58.0	If we put them all together, the book would be about a thousand pages, but we condense them down to make it juicy and concise and tight and very interesting.
2:06.0	So I hope you check out the book. We're now working on one about cancer.
	...

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