The Earth Critical Zone (ECZ) includes the area between the upper part of the vegetation and the aquifer. Many complex interactions occur in the ECZ involving rock, soil, water, air and living animal and plant organisms.
The analysis of the ECZ therefore requires an integrated, interdisciplinary and multiscale approach which – if correctly targeted and pursued – promises to improve our ability to predict and plan changes, to address several crucial issues of contemporary society, such as food security and human health, economic prosperity, environmental quality and sustainable development.
In particular, CRISP studies several important physical, chemical and biological processes at various spatial and temporal scales that influence the mass and energy exchanges necessary for biomass production, the biogeochemical cycles of nutrients and contaminants and water storage.
CRISP places the spatial analysis of the soil and the modeling of the processes that operate within it and at the interface with vegetation, rock and underground circulation at the center of its study.