Agricultural science (or agriscience for short) is a broad multidisciplinary field of

biology Biology is the scientific study of life. It is a natural science with a broad scope but has several unifying themes that tie it together as a single, coherent field. For instance, all organisms are made up of cells that process hereditar ...

that encompasses the parts of exact, natural, economic and

social science Social science is one of the branches of science, devoted to the study of societies and the relationships among individuals within those societies. The term was formerly used to refer to the field of sociology, the original "science of soc ...

s that are used in the practice and understanding of

agriculture Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled peop ...

. Professionals of the agricultural science are called agricultural scientists or

agriculturists An agriculturist, agriculturalist, agrologist, or agronomist (abbreviated as agr.), is a professional in the science, practice, and management of agriculture and agribusiness. It is a regulated profession in Canada, India, the Philippines, the U ...

History

In the 18th century, Johann Friedrich Mayer conducted experiments on the use of

gypsum Gypsum is a soft sulfate mineral composed of calcium sulfate dihydrate, with the chemical formula . It is widely mined and is used as a fertilizer and as the main constituent in many forms of plaster, blackboard or sidewalk chalk, and dr ...

(hydrated calcium sulphate) as a

fertilizer A fertilizer (American English) or fertiliser (British English; see spelling differences) is any material of natural or synthetic origin that is applied to soil or to plant tissues to supply plant nutrients. Fertilizers may be distinct from ...

.John Armstrong, Jesse Buel. ''A Treatise on Agriculture, The Present Condition of the Art Abroad and at Home, and the Theory and Practice of Husbandry. To which is Added, a Dissertation on the Kitchen and Garden.'' 1840. p. 45. In 1843, John Bennet Lawes and Joseph Henry Gilbert began a set of long-term field experiments at Rothamsted Research in England, some of which are still running as of 2018. In the United States, a scientific revolution in agriculture began with the Hatch Act of 1887, which used the term "agricultural science". The Hatch Act was driven by farmers' interest in knowing the constituents of early artificial fertilizer. The

Smith–Hughes Act The Smith–Hughes National Vocational Education Act of 1917 was an act of the United States Congress that promoted vocational education in "agriculture, trades and industry, and homemaking," and provided federal funds for this purpose. As such, it ...

of 1917 shifted agricultural education back to its vocational roots, but the scientific foundation had been built.Hillison J. (1996)
The Origins of Agriscience: Or Where Did All That Scientific Agriculture Come From?
. ''Journal of Agricultural Education''. After 1906, public expenditures on agricultural research in the US exceeded private expenditures for the next 44 years.Huffman WE, Evenson RE. (2006).
Science for Agriculture
'.

Blackwell Publishing Wiley-Blackwell is an international scientific, technical, medical, and scholarly publishing business of John Wiley & Sons. It was formed by the merger of John Wiley & Sons Global Scientific, Technical, and Medical business with Blackwell Publish ...

Prominent agricultural scientists

* Wilbur Olin Atwater * Robert Bakewell *

Norman Borlaug Norman Ernest Borlaug (; March 25, 1914September 12, 2009) was an American agronomist who led initiatives worldwide that contributed to the extensive increases in agricultural production termed the Green Revolution. Borlaug was awarded multipl ...

* Luther Burbank * George Washington Carver * Carl Henry Clerk * George C. Clerk * René Dumont * Sir Albert Howard * Kailas Nath Kaul * Thomas Lecky *

Justus von Liebig Justus Freiherr von Liebig (12 May 1803 – 20 April 1873) was a German scientist who made major contributions to agricultural and biology, biological chemistry, and is considered one of the principal founders of organic chemistry. As a profess ...

* Jay Laurence Lush *

Gregor Mendel Gregor Johann Mendel, OSA (; cs, Řehoř Jan Mendel; 20 July 1822 – 6 January 1884) was a biologist, meteorologist, mathematician, Augustinian friar and abbot of St. Thomas' Abbey in Brünn (''Brno''), Margraviate of Moravia. Mendel wa ...

* Louis Pasteur * M. S. Swaminathan * Jethro Tull * Artturi Ilmari Virtanen *

Sewall Wright Sewall Green Wright FRS(For) Honorary FRSE (December 21, 1889March 3, 1988) was an American geneticist known for his influential work on evolutionary theory and also for his work on path analysis. He was a founder of population genetics alon ...

Fields or related disciplines

Scope

Agriculture, agricultural science, and agronomy are often confused. However, they cover different concepts: *Agriculture is the set of activities that transform the environment for the production of animals and plants for human use. Agriculture concerns techniques, including the application of agronomic research. *

Agronomy Agronomy is the science and technology of producing and using plants by agriculture for food, fuel, fiber, chemicals, recreation, or land conservation. Agronomy has come to include research of plant genetics, plant physiology, meteorology, and s ...

research and development Research and development (R&D or R+D), known in Europe as research and technological development (RTD), is the set of innovative activities undertaken by corporations or governments in developing new services or products, and improving existi ...

related to studying and improving plant-based crops.

Soil forming factors and soil degradation

Agricultural sciences include research and development on: * Improving agricultural productivity in terms of quantity and quality (e.g., selection of drought-resistant crops and animals, development of new pesticides, yield-sensing technologies, simulation models of crop growth, in-vitro cell culture techniques) * Minimizing the effects of pests (

weed A weed is a plant considered undesirable in a particular situation, "a plant in the wrong place", or a plant growing where it is not wanted.Harlan, J. R., & deWet, J. M. (1965). Some thoughts about weeds. ''Economic botany'', ''19''(1), 16-24. ...

insect Insects (from Latin ') are pancrustacean hexapod invertebrates of the class Insecta. They are the largest group within the arthropod phylum. Insects have a chitinous exoskeleton, a three-part body (head, thorax and abdomen), three pairs ...

pathogen In biology, a pathogen ( el, πάθος, "suffering", "passion" and , "producer of") in the oldest and broadest sense, is any organism or agent that can produce disease. A pathogen may also be referred to as an infectious agent, or simply a ger ...

mollusk Mollusca is the second-largest phylum of invertebrate animals after the Arthropoda, the members of which are known as molluscs or mollusks (). Around 85,000 extant species of molluscs are recognized. The number of fossil species is es ...

s, nematodes) on crop or animal production systems. * Transformation of primary products into end-consumer products (e.g., production, preservation, and packaging of dairy products) * Prevention and correction of adverse environmental effects (e.g., soil degradation, waste management,

bioremediation Bioremediation broadly refers to any process wherein a biological system (typically bacteria, microalgae, fungi, and plants), living or dead, is employed for removing environmental pollutants from air, water, soil, flue gasses, industrial effluent ...

) * Theoretical production ecology, relating to crop production modeling * Traditional agricultural systems, sometimes termed subsistence agriculture, which feed most of the poorest people in the world. These systems are of interest as they sometimes retain a level of integration with natural ecological systems greater than that of industrial agriculture, which may be more sustainable than some modern agricultural systems. * Food production and demand on a global basis, with special attention paid to the major producers, such as China, India, Brazil, the US and the EU. * Various sciences relating to agricultural resources and the environment (e.g. soil science, agroclimatology); biology of agricultural crops and animals (e.g. crop science, animal science and their included sciences, e.g. ruminant nutrition, farm animal welfare); such fields as agricultural economics and rural sociology; various disciplines encompassed in agricultural engineering.

References

External links

Consultative Group on International Agricultural Research (CGIAR)Agricultural Research ServiceIndian Council of Agricultural ResearchInternational Institute of Tropical AgricultureInternational Livestock Research InstituteThe National Agricultural Library (NAL)
- The most comprehensive agricultural library in the world.
Crop Science Society of AmericaAmerican Society of AgronomySoil Science Society of AmericaAgricultural Science Researchers, Jobs and DiscussionsInformation System for Agriculture and Food ResearchNMSU Department of Entomology Plant Pathology and Weed Science
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