Soil Institute
Soil Institute
(full name, V. V. Dokuchaev Soil Institute of the Lenin All-Union Academy of Agricultural Sciences), an institute established in Leningrad in 1927 to replace the Soil Section of the Commission for the Study of Natural Productive Forces under the Academy of Sciences of the USSR. Relocated in Moscow in 1934, the institute was part of the Academy of Sciences of the USSR until April 1961.
In 1974 the institute had departments of soil genesis, geography, and classification; large-scale mapping of soils; improvement of irrigated soils; erosion control; agricultural zonation and evaluation of soils; agricultural chemistry; and soil physics and technology. It also had laboratories of soil hydrology and drainage, the reclamation of solonets soils, soil chemistry, soil mineralogy and physical chemistry, and soil biochemistry and microbiology. The institute administers the V. V. Dokuchaev Central Museum of Soil Science in Leningrad.
The institute is engaged in describing the soil cover of the USSR and evaluating its soil resources, compiling various kinds of soil maps, and developing principles of zonation of irrigated land for the purpose of soil conservation. The institute has worked out comprehensive measures for controlling secondary salinization and improving solonets soils. It accepts candidate’s and doctoral dissertations for defense. The institute has published Trudy (Proceedings) since 1933.