Nondestructive Determination of Humic Acids in Soils by Near Infrared Reflectance Spectroscopy

Near-infrared reflectance spectroscopy(NIRS) was used to determine the humic acids in soil samples from the fields of different crops and land-use over Youngnam and Honam regions in Korea. An InfraAlyzer 500 scanning spectrophotometer was obtained near infrared relectance spectra of soil at 2-nm intervals from 1100 to 2500nm. Multiple linear regression(MLR) or partial least square regression (PLSR) was used to evaluate a NIRS method for the rapid and nondestructive determination of humic acid, fulvic acid and its total contents in soils. The raw spectral data(log 1/R) can be used for estimating humic acid, fulvic acid and its total contents in soil by MLR procedure between the content of a given constituent and the spectral response of several bands. In which the predicted results for fulvic acid is the best in the constituents. The new spectral data are converted from the raw spectra by PLSR method such as the first derivative of each spectrum can also be used to predict humic acid and fulvic acid of the soil samples. A low SEC, SEP and a high coefficient of correlation in the calibration and validation stages enable selection of the best manipulation. But a simple calibration and prediction method for determining humic acid and fulvic acid should be selected under similar accuracy and precision of prediction. NIRS technique may be an effective method for rapid and nondestructive determination for humic acid, fulvic acid and its total contents in soils.