Hazai talajszelvények fitolit morfotípus-diverzitása (original) (raw)

One way of utilizing soils in research on environment history is to detect and understand the plant opal assemblages in soil profiles. Plant opal particles, also known as phytoliths, accumulate in the topsoil and represent an inorganic inprint of the surface vegetation. A phytolith assemblage is primarily characterized by the plant association that produces it, but secondary processes such as soil formation and human impacts may also influence the vertical distribution and appearance of phytoliths within a soil profile. The qualitative analysis of plant opal particles allows us to reconstruct former environments, whilst quantitative observations can be used to understand the influence of the monotonous or periodically changing vegetation that inhabits the surface. This paper presents an analysis of a soil phytolith database consisting of 117 samples taken from 20 profiles. The aim was to demonstrate how diversity indices, which are primarily designed to characterize biomes, can be applied to soil phytolith studies in order to describe the phytolith-producing potential of soil representing various habitats and plant associations. The morphotype diversity indices used in the study are able to shed light on the complexity of soil development. Based on the calculation of morphotype diversity indices, three major soil types were distinguished. In the case of Type I, both the phytolith content and the morphotype diversity increased as a consequence of natural and artificial effects, resulting in a phytolith surplus compared to natural processes. In Type II, due to the geomorphological position of the soil profile and fluvial processes (surface instability in general), a decrease in the phytolith content and the morphotype diversity can be detected, which leads to phytolith and organic matter deficits. Intact profiles, where the phytolith composition depends only on the vegetation, were classified as Type III; the morphotype diversity and vertical distribution of the phytoliths at this type are mainly affected by internal processes.

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