Soil science is an interdisciplinary science with both pure and applied aspects. Soil science focuses on soil as a natural resource, in particular its use [Page 1636]and management. V.V. Dokuchaev is considered the father of modern soil science. Previously, soils had been equated with bedrock. Dokuchaev suggested that soil was very different from bedrock because a range of soil forming factors (climate, topography, biota, parent material, time) influence its genesis.

Soil science is broad in scope, encompassing a range of subdisciplines working on topics including soil formation and classification and mapping, as well as soil fertility and soil's physical, chemical, and biological properties. Pedology is the branch of soil science that researches the nature, properties, formation, distribution (i.e., soil geography), and function of soils and is, ...