Healthy soils play an important role in food production, climate change mitigation, and maintaining biodiversity. However, roots have not received the attention or research they warrant considering their role in drawing nutrients and transferring carbon, supporting and modulating the complex microbiome that lies unseen beneath our feet.
Despite their importance, there are few tools available to farmers to reliably monitor, quantify, and improve either soil health or root development. It is challenging to understand how interventions may affect crop yield and quality.
The TRUTH project is creating a farmer-led platform to quantify and evaluate soil/root interactions and explore the capabilities of a novel sensor that can ‘smell’ a soil’s biological signature.
Led by BOFIN, TRUTH is a three-year £1m research programme, led by BOFIN alongside four partners. It is funded by the Farming Futures R&D fund, part of Defra’s Farming Innovation Programme which is delivered by Innovate UK. Project number: 10085980.
