Water Potential 101–Making Use of an Important Tool

Master the basics of soil water potential.

In this webinar, Dr. Doug Cobos differentiates water potential from water content, discusses the theory, application, and key components of water potential, as well as the implications water potential has for researchers and irrigation management.

Next steps

Watch more on water potential: Water Potential 201- Choosing the Right Instrument
Defining water potential- What it is. How to use it.
View water potential sensors
Request a ZENTRA Cloud live demo

Questions?

Our scientists have decades of experience helping researchers and growers measure the soil-plant-atmosphere continuum.

Presenter

Dr. Cobos is a Research Scientist and the Director of Research and Development at METER. He also holds an adjunct appointment in the Department of Crop and Soil Sciences at Washington State University where he co-teaches Environmental Biophysics. Doug’s Masters Degree from Texas A&M and Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota focused on field-scale fluxes of CO₂ and mercury, respectively. Doug was hired at METER to be the Lead Engineer in charge of designing the Thermal and Electrical Conductivity Probe (TECP) that flew to Mars aboard NASA’s 2008 Phoenix Scout Lander. His current research is centered on instrumentation development for soil and plant sciences.

Webinars

See all webinars

Water Potential 201—Choosing the Right Instrument

Watch webinar

Learn water potential instrument theory, including the challenges of measuring water potential and how to choose and use various water potential instruments.

Webinars52 min watch

Water Potential 301–How to Push Your Instruments Past their Specifications

Watch webinar

Learn the skills needed to create a soil water characteristic curve with wet end and dry end data that actually match up in the middle.

Webinars54 min watch

Water Potential 401–Advances in Field Water Potential

Watch webinar

In this webinar, Dr. Doug Cobos discusses field water potential sensor characteristics, equilibrations and advances in technology.

Webinars45 min watch