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Abstract The environmental distribution of Burkholderia pseudomallei, the causative agent of melioidosis, remains poorly understood. B. pseudomallei is known to have the ability to occupy a variety of environmental niches, particularly in soil. This paper provides novel information about a putative association of soil biogeochemical heterogeneity and the vertical distribution of B. pseudomallei. We investigated (1) the distribution of B. pseudomallei along a 300-cm deep soil profile together with the variation of a range of soil physico-chemical properties; (2) whether correlations between the distribution of B. pseudomallei and soil physico-chemical properties exist and (3) when they exist, what such correlations indicate with regards to the environmental conditions conducive to the occurrence of B. pseudomallei in soils. Unexpectedly, the highest concentrations of B. pseudomallei were observed between 100 and 200 cm below the soil surface. Our results indicate that unravelling the environmental conditions favorable to B. pseudomallei entails considering many aspects of the actual complexity of soil. Important recommendations regarding environmental sampling for B. pseudomallei can be drawn from this work, in particular that collecting samples down to the water table is of foremost importance, as groundwater persistence appears to be a controlling factor of the occurrence of B. pseudomallei in soil.

Abstract Soil erosion supplies large quantities of sediments to rivers of Southeastern Asia. It reduces soil fertility of agro-ecosystems located on hillslopes, and it degrades, downstream, water resource quality and leads to the siltation of reservoirs. An increase in the surface area covered with commercial perennial monocultures such as teak plantations is currently observed at the expanse of traditional slash-and-burn cultivation systems in steep montane environments of these regions. The impacts of land-use change on the hydrological response and sediment yields have been investigated in a representative catchment of Laos monitored for 13 years. After the gradual conversion of rice-based shifting cultivation to teak plantation-based systems, overland flow contribution to stream flow increased from 16 to 31% and sediment yield raised from 98 to 609 Mg km−2. This result is explained by the higher kinetic energy of raindrops falling from the canopy, the virtual absence of understorey vegetation cover to dissipate drop energy and the formation of an impermeable surface crust accelerating the formation and concentration of overland flow. The 25-to-50% lower 137Cs activities measured in soils collected under mature teak plantations compared to soils under other land uses illustrate the severity of soil erosion processes occurring in teak plantations.