Non Technical Summary
Soil organic matter is one of the most complex components of terrestrial ecosystems and serves vital functions in terms of regulating the flow and supply of nutrients to plants, regulating water flow and water retention in soils and determining the physical attributes of soils. Hence, the maintenance and management of SOM is absolutely vital for the sustainability of croplands, grassland, forests and wetlands. More recently, increased attention has been focused on the role of soils in the global carbon cycle, where the world's soils contain around 1.5-2 trillion tonnes of carbon or roughly 4 times the amount contained in all the world's vegetation and 3 times the amount of carbon (as CO2) in the earth's atmosphere. Hence, relatively small changes in the global storage of C in SOM can have large effects on greenhouse concentrations - either positively or negatively. Managing soils to maintain and increase organic matter stocks can contribute to greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation. There is a growing interest in improving land use and management to help mitigate GHG emissions, particularly in many developing countries. Incorporating sustainable land management projects as part of new national and international policies on climate change opens the possibility to radically improve the prospects for improved livelihoods and more sustainable land use practices in developing countries. Research directed at improving our understanding of, and ability to accurately predict, changes in soil organic matter, across the range of managed ecosystems - from cropland, grazing lands, forests and wetlands - is moving very rapidly. Increasingly the science community is being called upon to provide the knowledge and tools needed to support policies directed towards sustainable land use and GHG mitigation, involving soil organic matter. This conference will bring together leading scientists as well as young early career scientists and students to present the latest research results, discuss key knowledge gaps and new methodologies, lay out future directions for research, and promote collaborations towards a more global capability to assess changes in SOM stocks and trends. Dedicated sessions will examine major topical issues including: temperature and SOM feedbacks; biofuels, SOM and GHG emissions; tillage and soil depth influences on SOM; nitrogen and SOM interactions; advances in soil C accounting at different scales; SOM in cold and flooded environments; and advances in SOM characterization. A detailed description of the main topics to be discussed is given below in the conference agenda. Papers from the conference will be published as a special issue in the international journal Plant and Soil.

Classification

Knowledge Area (KA)	Subject of Investigation (SOI)	Field of Science (FOS)	Percent
101	0110	2061	20%
102	0110	1070	80%

Knowledge Area
102 - Soil, Plant, Water, Nutrient Relationships; 101 - Appraisal of Soil Resources;

Subject Of Investigation
0110 - Soil;

Field Of Science
1070 - Ecology; 2061 - Pedology;

Goals / Objectives
This proposal is for a Conference Grant for an International Symposium on Soil Organic Matter Dynamics: Land use, Management and Global Change, July 6-9th, 2009, in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Objectives of the conference are to present new research, discuss knowledge gaps and new methodologies, lay out future directions for research, and develop global collaborations to better assess SOM stocks and changes. Sessions will examine major topical issues: temperature and SOM feedbacks; biofuels, SOM and greenhouse gases; tillage, soil depth and SOM; nitrogen and SOM interactions; soil C accounting; SOM in cold and flooded environments; and advances in SOM characterization. The event will fill an important niche for a focused meeting on SOM dynamics, linking basic mechanisms to ecosystem and larger scale processes and the influences of land use, management and climate. Papers from the conference will be published as a special issue in Plant and Soil. The topics included in the conference address all three of the USDA/AFRI Soil Processes Priority Areas, including 1) interdisciplinary studies among soil physical, chemical, and biological processes relating to soil sustainability, 2) linking fine-scale (molecular, microsite) to large scale (field, watershed, region) processes controlling SOM, and 3) application of new methods, tools and strategies to enhance understanding of dynamic properties of SOM.

Project Methods
All Symposium activities will take place at the Cheyenne Mountain Resort, Colorado Spring, Colorado USA. The facility has complete conference capabilities and accommodations to support the anticipated size of the conference (ca. 300 persons). The symposium includes 3 plenary sessions (Climate and SOM dynamics; SOM, soil disturbance and tillage; Developments in SOM characterization methods - what do they tell us about SOM dynamics) and 6 parallel oral sessions (Biofuels, SOM and net GHG balance; SOM and soil depth - controls on C and N balance; Nitrogen and SOM dynamics; Soil C quantification for GHG accounting; SOM dynamics in flooded, organic and high latitude soils; SOM - global & regional perspectives)and poster displays in aach of the topical areas. Contributions from the Symposium will be published in a special issue of Plant and Soil.