Over the last decades, a new generation of microscale models has been developed to simulate soil microbial activity. An earlier article (Pot et al., 2021) presented a detailed review of the description of soil architecture and microbial dynamics in these models. In the present article, we summarise the main results obtained by these models according to six model outputs: growth and spatial organisation of microbial colonies, soil hydraulic conductivity, coexistence and trophic interactions of microorganisms, temporal dynamics of the amount of solid and dissolved organic matter in soil and, microbial production of CO₂. For each of these outputs, we draw particular attention to the respective roles of soil architecture and microbial dynamics, and we report how microscale models allow for disentangling and quantifying them. We finally discuss limitations and future directions of microscale models in combination with the on-going development of high-performance imaging tools revealing the spatial heterogeneity of the actors of soil microbial activity.

中文翻译：

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了解土壤结构和微生物动力学对土壤功能的联合影响：来自微尺度模型的见解

在过去的几十年中，已经开发出新一代的微型模型来模拟土壤微生物活动。较早的一篇文章（Pot 等人，2021 年）详细回顾了这些模型中对土壤结构和微生物动力学的描述。在本文中，我们根据六个模型输出总结了这些模型获得的主要结果：微生物菌落的生长和空间组织、土壤水力传导性、微生物的共存和营养相互作用、固体和溶解有机物量的时间动态在土壤和微生物产生 CO ₂. 对于这些输出中的每一个，我们特别关注土壤结构和微生物动力学的各自作用，并报告微尺度模型如何允许解开和量化它们。我们最后讨论了微型模型的局限性和未来方向，并结合了高性能成像工具的持续发展，揭示了土壤微生物活动参与者的空间异质性。