Soil bioengineering in northeastern Brazil: An Overview

This paper presents an overview of soil bioengineering techniques also known as natural engineering developed in the state of Sergipe, northeastern Brazil, and shows the importance of integrating living and inert elements to protect river banks from erosion. We cover aspects ranging from the characterization of susceptibility to erosion to the use of biotechniques, in areas such as agronomy engineering, forest engineering, biology, pedology, geomorphology, and geotechnology. Our approach was to focus on those interdisciplinary techniques and methodologies that address different applications, to maximize synergies (e.g., natural engineering techniques for combining inert materials in ways that help plants develop increasingly efficient systems); this approach also means lower maintenance costs than with methods that use merely inert materials. Our research works at different locations sought to benefit from studies using techniques for making use of available materials rocky and geotextiles and identifying the suitable species for the ecological conditions on the diverse environments in northeastern Brazil, considering the size and range of technological, ecological, economic and aesthetic objectives. Along the Lower São Francisco River margin, the primary need is stabilization of the river banks, through recovery of the riparian vegetation. If erosion of these banks can thus be controlled, siltation of the river will be greatly reduced.

本文综述了巴西东北部塞尔希培州开发的土壤生物工程（soil bioengineering，又称自然工程natural engineering）技术，并阐明了整合活体与惰性元素以防护河岸侵蚀的重要价值。本文涵盖了从侵蚀敏感性表征到生物工程技术应用的多个研究维度，涉及农业工程、森林工程、生物学、土壤学（pedology）、地貌学（geomorphology）与土工技术（geotechnology）等交叉学科领域。本研究聚焦于可适配多类应用场景的跨学科技术与方法，以最大化协同效应——例如，通过合理组合惰性材料以助力植物构建愈发高效的防护系统的自然工程技术；相较于仅使用惰性材料的防护方案，该方法可有效降低运维成本。我们在不同区域开展的研究，旨在借助利用现有材料（岩石与土工织物geotextiles）的相关技术，结合技术、生态、经济与美学目标的规模与范畴，筛选出适配巴西东北部多样生态环境条件的适宜物种。在圣弗朗西斯科河下游沿岸区域，当前的核心需求是通过恢复河岸植被（riparian vegetation）实现河岸稳固。若能有效控制此类河岸的侵蚀，便可大幅降低河道淤积程度。