Morphology and multifractal characteristics of soil pores and their functional implication

[Display omitted] •Macropore characteristics differ significantly among the four soil types.•The D1 increases from loessial, Lou, aeolian sandy to light dark loessial soil.•The ΔD is dominant predicting variable for the theoretical Ks and total porosity.•Macropore number plays an incomparable role in soil pore structure. As an important inherentcondition for an eroded landform and fragile ecosystem, the erodible loess in China’s Loess Plateau is a clastic and predominantly silt-sized sediment. Understanding the pore complexity of the loess may be crucial for exploring soil functional properties and improving knowledge on hydrological dynamic processes occurring in the soil plant atmosphere continuum. Twelve undisturbed columns of four typical soil types, namely, aeolian sandy, light dark loessial, loessial, and Lou soils, were collected for the multifractal analysis of X-ray computed tomography images. The heterogeneity of soil pore distribution and the measure of porosity dispersion relative to the pore size dispersion in the loessial and Lou soils were significantly lower than those of the aeolian sandy and light dark loessial soils. The loessial soil exhibited the highest symmetry of singularity spectra and presented the lowest variability for pore arrangement. Most correlations among parameters of soil properties, multifractal characteristics, as well as soil macropore morphology and connectivity characteristics, were significant (p