Research Divisions
Dr. R. S. Chaudhary, Head of Soil Physics, Email: rsc@iiss.res.in
Soil Chemistry and Fertility
Dr. A. K. Biswas, HOD, Email: akb@iiss.res.in
Soil Biology
Dr. M.C. Manna, HOD, Email: mcm@iiss.res.in
Environmental Soil Science
Dr. J.K. Saha, HOD, Email: jks@iiss.res.in
Dr. Manoranjan Mohanty, In-Charge, Email: mmohanty@iiss.res.in
Dr. J. Somasundaram, In-Charge, somasundaram@iiss.res.in,aris@iiss.res.in
Soil Physics- Soil Chemistry and Fertility
- Soil Biology
- Environmental Soil Science
- Remote Sensing and GIS Laboratory
- Agricultural Knowledge Management Unit (AKMU)
- Library,Information and documentation Services
- Infrastrusture Development
Dr. R. S. Chaudhary, Head of Soil Physics, Email: rsc@iiss.res.in
 The major focus of research of this division is on enhancing/ sustaining soil quality, productivity and input use efficiency through studies on conservation tillage, interaction of water and nutrient/ tillage, crop diversification, rain-water harvesting and moisture conservation, simulation models for water and nutrient transmission and uptake, management of soil physical properties, soil aggregation dynamics, soil organic carbon conservation and sequestration in relation climate change etc. The divisional laboratory is equipped with sophisticated equipments (pressure plate apparatus, sand box, neutron moisture meter, depth density gauge, Guelph permeameter, K-permeameter, rainfall simulator, wet sieving apparatus, root scanner and image analysis system, automatic runoff recorder and sediment collection, automatic weather station etc.) |
Dr. A. K. Biswas, HOD, Email: akb@iiss.res.in
 The Division is poised to play a key role in meeting out the challenges enumerated in the vision 2050 of the institute, especially, the challenges for ensuring food and nutritional security from shrinking land resources and achieving self reliance in crop fertilization through indigenous mineral and by-product sources. The Division will also be playing a key role in generating wisdom, and techniques for sustaining soil health and improving nutrient use efficiency through precision agriculture, nanotechnology and biotechnology. Besides, the Division will continue to collaborate with scientists from other divisions in meeting out the challenges of characterizing and conserving large soil-biodiversity for appropriate deployment in agriculture; developing efficient technologies of waste recycling; maintaining soil quality and ecological balance, and developing energy efficient agriculture, carbon sequestration etc.. |
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Dr. M.C. Manna, HOD, Email: mcm@iiss.res.in
 Division of Soil Biology is entrusted with responsibility to undertake research on maintaining soil biodiversity in agro-ecosystem. Soil biochemical attributes and produce quality indices, development of technologies of recycling of various C: N ratio wastes, assessment of soil quality parameters, quality of organic pools, soil C/C sequestration under different agro system, characterization of functional communities of soil organisms and microbial biodiversities have been taken up as major programme of research. Important equipments in this divisional laboratory include HPLC, GLC, laminar flow, BOD incubator, research microscope with camera and CCTV system, automatic media distributor, incubator shaker and other basic facilities like muffle furnace, vacuum driver, water purification system, Gerhardt block digester and inoculation room. |
Dr. J.K. Saha, HOD, Email: jks@iiss.res.in
 The Division is entrusted with the responsibility to create a database on the extent of soil pollution due to indiscriminate use of fertilizers, city, industrial and agricultural wastes for crop production and to develop suitable prescriptions and technologies for safe recycling of these wastes into agriculturally productive soils. The division is also engaged in evaluating sink capacity of soils for heavy metal pollutants and major environmental issues related to organic farming. The divisional laboratory is equipped with the equipments like, Polarographic analyzer, Water analyzer, Soxlet apparatus, BOD and COD analyzer, Infra red gas analyzer (IRGA), Water potential system, TLC, Ion chromatograph, UV-visible spectrophotometer, N distillation system, Flame photometer, Nephalometer besides other basic facilities. |
The Remote sensing and GIS laboratory has been established to disseminate knowledge of geospatial technologies in natural resource management and to support advanced research and education in environmental remote sensing, GIS, spatial analysis and modeling. The laboratory is well equipped with work stations, digitiser, plotter, ArcGIS, ERDAS Imagine and SPSS. It provides state-of-art facility for GIS, image processing, modelling, statistical analysis and visualisation.
Agricultural Knowledge Management Unit (AKMU) Dr. J. Somasundaram, In-Charge, somasundaram@iiss.res.in,aris@iiss.res.in
Agricultural Knowledge Management Unit (AKMU) is equipped with all modern facilities to provide e-mail connectivity and browsing facility through Internet to all the scientists and officials. Local Area Network (LAN) Server has been connected to Internet through our own VSAT. LAN is in operation with 75 nodes. AKMU is maintaining its own e-mail server (iiss) using Linux (Red Hat 9.0). E-mail accounts of all the scientists and officials have been created. The AKMU is also engaged in creating database related to soil nutrients. Home page and website for the Institute have been launched.
| Mrs. Nirmala Mahajan, In-Charge, Email: nmahajan1@iiss.res.in The library is well maintained with facilities lending, reference service, reprographic services etc. The Library also exchanges the institute publication with the other ICAR Institutes, SAUs and renowned Scientists in the field of Soil Science. The institute library has been further strengthened with following new additions.
 The library is well maintained with the facilities of Document Lending Service, Reference service, Reprographic Service. During this year, library has acquired AGRIS database of FAO under the NATP scheme in order to strengthen the library. The library is already having SOIL-CD on the CD media and is providing search facilities to users. The databases of books, annual reports, and other documents are being maintained on Window version of CDS/ISIS, i.e., WINISIS. Current Awareness Service (CAS) is also being provided to the users by content page of the journal(s). | ||||||||||||||||||||