World's Best Scientists 2026 revealed!
Soil Biology and Biochemistry
H-index 88

Soil Biology and Biochemistry

Ranking & Metrics

Discipline name Position Best Scientists Publications D-Index
Environmental Sciences 26 268 510 70

Additional Metrics

Number of Best Scientists*: 1068
Documents by Best Scientists*: 1247
Top 100 Ranked Scientists*: 53
SCIMAGO H-index: 285
SCIMAGO SJR: 3.982
Impact Factor: 10.3

Overview

Top Research Topics at Soil Biology & Biochemistry?

Soil Biology & Biochemistry primarily tackles Soil water, Agronomy, Botany, Environmental chemistry and Ecology. Most of the Soil water studies addressed also intersect with Organic matter. Some problems in Organic matter that were presented in it overlapped with concepts under Humus and Total organic carbon.

The studies on Agronomy discussed can also contribute to research in the domains of Nutrient, Soil fertility and Microbial population biology. Botany research featured in Soil Biology & Biochemistry incorporates concerns from various other topics such as Horticulture, Rhizosphere, Bacteria, Mycorrhiza and Litter. The featured Environmental chemistry studies mainly concentrate on Incubation but also cover areas of interest in Animal science.

The journal facilitated presentations on Ecology research, particularly Ecosystem, Soil biology, Biomass (ecology), Earthworm and Abundance (ecology). The journal features Soil organic matter research that overlaps with concepts in Soil respiration. The Mineralization (soil science) study tackled is a key component of adjacent topics in the area of Nitrogen cycle.

  • Soil water (39.35%)
  • Agronomy (30.80%)
  • Botany (27.19%)

What are the most cited papers published in the journal?

  • AN EXTRACTION METHOD FOR MEASURING SOIL MICROBIAL BIOMASS C (7985 citations)
  • Chloroform fumigation and the release of soil nitrogen: A rapid direct extraction method to measure microbial biomass nitrogen in soil (3726 citations)
  • Use of p-nitrophenyl phosphate for assay of soil phosphatase activity (2660 citations)

Research areas of the most cited articles at Soil Biology & Biochemistry:

The most cited papers explore disciplines such as Soil water, Agronomy, Botany, Environmental chemistry and Ecology. Organic matter and Microbial population biology are some topics wherein Soil water research discussed in the journal papers has an impact. The journal publications deal with Agronomy in conjunction with Biomass and similar fields in Fumigation.

What topics the last edition of the journal is best known for?

  • Ecology
  • Botany
  • Enzyme

The previous edition focused in particular on these issues:

Soil Biology & Biochemistry generally zeroes in on subjects such as Soil water, Environmental chemistry, Agronomy, Soil carbon and Ecosystem. The subject of Nitrification, which is connected to the field of Denitrification, serves as the foundation of the Soil water research featured in it. Aside from discussions in Environmental chemistry, Soil Biology & Biochemistry also deals with the subject of Soil organic matter which intersects with Plant litter disciplines.

The journal deals with Agronomy in conjunction with Rhizosphere and similar fields in Botany. Issues in Soil carbon were discussed, taking into consideration concepts from other disciplines like Soil respiration, Biogeochemical cycle and Cycling. The Ecosystem study which was featured in the journal aims to expound on the research in Ecology.

The most cited articles from the last journal are:

  • Plant- or microbial-derived? A review on the molecular composition of stabilized soil organic matter (20 citations)
  • How microbes can, and cannot, be used to assess soil health (15 citations)
  • Global patterns and associated drivers of priming effect in response to nutrient addition (12 citations)

Papers citation over time

A key indicator for each journal is its effectiveness in reaching other researchers with the papers published at that venue.

The chart below presents the interquartile range (first quartile 25%, median 50% and third quartile 75%) of the number of citations of articles over time.

The top authors publishing in Soil Biology & Biochemistry (based on the number of publications) are:

  • Yakov Kuzyakov (127 papers) published 15 papers at the last edition, 1 more than at the previous edition,
  • Philip C. Brookes (94 papers) absent at the last edition,
  • Davey L. Jones (88 papers) published 10 papers at the last edition, 1 more than at the previous edition,
  • Stefan Scheu (82 papers) published 3 papers at the last edition, 1 more than at the previous edition,
  • Erland Bååth (71 papers) published 3 papers at the last edition.

The overall trend for top authors publishing in this journal is outlined below. The chart shows the number of publications at each edition of the journal for top authors.

Only papers with recognized affiliations are considered

The top affiliations publishing in Soil Biology & Biochemistry (based on the number of publications) are:

  • Chinese Academy of Sciences (643 papers) published 66 papers at the last edition, 8 less than at the previous edition,
  • Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (300 papers) published 1 paper at the last edition, 1 less than at the previous edition,
  • University of Göttingen (258 papers) published 19 papers at the last edition, 1 more than at the previous edition,
  • Institut national de la recherche agronomique (256 papers) published 3 papers at the last edition, 2 more than at the previous edition,
  • Spanish National Research Council (241 papers) published 8 papers at the last edition, 2 less than at the previous edition.

The overall trend for top affiliations publishing in this journal is outlined below. The chart shows the number of publications at each edition of the journal for top affiliations.

Publication chance based on affiliation

The publication chance index shows the ratio of articles published by the best research institutions in the journal edition to all articles published within that journal. The best research institutions were selected based on the largest number of articles published during all editions of the journal.

The chart below presents the percentage ratio of articles from top institutions (based on their ranking of total papers).Top affiliations were grouped by their rank into the following tiers: top 1-10, top 11-20, top 21-50, and top 51+. Only articles with a recognized affiliation are considered.

During the most recent 2021 edition, 3.56% of publications had an unrecognized affiliation. Out of the publications with recognized affiliations, 40.27% were posted by at least one author from the top 10 institutions publishing in the journal. Another 7.38% included authors affiliated with research institutions from the top 11-20 affiliations. Institutions from the 21-50 range included 18.12% of all publications and 34.23% were from other institutions.

Returning Authors Index

A very common phenomenon observed among researchers publishing scientific articles is the intentional selection of journals they have already attended in the past. In particular, it is worth analyzing the case when the authors participate in the same journal from year to year.

The Returning Authors Index presented below illustrates the ratio of authors who participated in both a given as well as the previous edition of the journal in relation to all participants in a given year.

Returning Institution Index

The graph below shows the Returning Institution Index, illustrating the ratio of institutions that participated in both a given and the previous edition of the conference in relation to all affiliations present in a given year.

The experience to innovation index

Our experience to innovation index was created to show a cross-section of the experience level of authors publishing in a journal. The index includes the authors publishing at the last edition of a journal, grouped by total number of publications throughout their academic career (P) and the total number of citations of these publications ever received (C).

The group intervals were selected empirically to best show the diversity of the authors' experiences, their labels were selected as a convenience, not as judgment. The authors were divided into the following groups:

  • Novice - P < 5 or C < 25 (the number of publications less than 5 or the number of citations less than 25),
  • Competent - P < 10 or C < 100 (the number of publications less than 10 or the number of citations less than 100),
  • Experienced - P < 25 or C < 625 (the number of publications less than 25 or the number of citations less than 625),
  • Master - P < 50 or C < 2500 (the number of publications less than 50 or the number of citations less than 2500),
  • Star - P ≥ 50 and C ≥ 2500 (both the number of publications greater than 50 and the number of citations greater than 2500).

The chart below illustrates experience levels of first authors in cases of publications with multiple authors.

Top Publications

  • Plant- or microbial-derived? A review on the molecular composition of stabilized soil organic matter

    Gerrit Angst;Kevin E. Mueller;Klaas G.J. Nierop;Myrna J. Simpson

    (2021)
    975 Citations
  • Microbial necromass as the source of soil organic carbon in global ecosystems

    Baorong Wang;Shaoshan An;Shaoshan An;Chao Liang;Yang Liu

    (2021)
    798 Citations
  • The microplastisphere: biodegradable microplastics addition alters soil microbial community structure and function

    Jie Zhou;Jie Zhou;Heng Gui;Callum C. Banfield;Yuan Wen

    (2021)
    545 Citations
  • Rare microbial taxa as the major drivers of ecosystem multifunctionality in long-term fertilized soils

    Qing-Lin Chen;Qing-Lin Chen;Jing Ding;Dong Zhu;Hang-Wei Hu

    (2020)
    532 Citations
  • Do cover crops benefit soil microbiome? A meta-analysis of current research

    Nakian Kim;María C. Zabaloy;Kaiyu Guan;María B. Villamil

    (2020)
    426 Citations
  • Carbon and nitrogen recycling from microbial necromass to cope with C:N stoichiometric imbalance by priming

    Jun Cui;Zhenke Zhu;Xingliang Xu;Shoulong Liu

    (2020)
    417 Citations

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Best Scientists Contributing to This Journal