Micro-scale spatial correlation of magnetic susceptibility in soil profile in forest located in an industrial area

• Analysis of microscale magnetic susceptibility spatial correlation in soil profile
• Typical variogram of magnetic susceptibility: Gaussian model, no nugget effect
• Correlation range is a good indicator of pollutant dispersion in soil profile.
• Correlation range is independent of the concentration of accumulated pollutants.

So far, studies concerning the analyses of the soil magnetic susceptibility in the soil profile have been usually making use of classic statistics. The number of papers where spatial correlations of magnetic susceptibility were analyzed is still limited. In particular, the micro-scale spatial correlations have been rarely analyzed.The goal of this study was to analyze microscale spatial correlations of magnetic susceptibility in the soil profiles collected in an old park, located in the Upper Silesian Industrial Region. In particular, the micro-correlations of κ were investigated by using measurements of soil κ values made with a SM400 device. The use of this device was necessary because the spatial resolution of other devices like Bartington MS2C or MS2H was too low. The spatial correlations of soil κ were investigated by calculating directional variograms along the soil profile and then modeling them. Analyses of spatial correlations were calculated separately for the topsoil and subsoil layers.The spatial correlations of the soil magnetic susceptibility in soil profiles collected in the forested study area were characterized by the Gaussian model with no nugget effect. The linear regression showed clear dependence between the thickness of the topsoil and the range of correlation of the soil magnetic susceptibility in the soil profile.