Draft:Outline of agricultural science

Agricultural science can be described as all of the following:

• an academic discipline – branch of knowledge. It incorporates expertise, people, projects, communities, challenges, studies, inquiry, and research areas that are strongly associated with a given scholastic subject area or college department.
• branch of science – systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe.
  • branch of natural science – branch of science concerned with the description, prediction, and understanding of natural phenomena, based on observational and empirical evidence.
    • branch of biology – natural science concerned with the study of life and living organisms, including their structure, function, growth, evolution, distribution, identification and taxonomy.
  • branch of applied science – discipline of science that applies existing scientific knowledge to develop more practical applications, like technology or inventions.
    • branch of agriculture – cultivation and breeding of animals, plants and fungi for food, fiber, biofuel, medicinal plants and other products used to sustain and enhance human life.

• Agricultural systems
  • Aeroponics
  • Aquaponics
  • Agroforestry
  • Biointensive agriculture
  • Building-integrated agriculture
  • Climate-smart agriculture
  • Dryland farming
  • Foodscaping
  • Industrial agriculture
  • Intensive farming
    • Intensive animal farming
  • Organic farming
  • Permaculture
  • Polyculture
  • [[Regenerative agriculture]}
  • Slash-and-burn agriculture
  • Subsistence agriculture
  • Sustainable agriculture – subsistence agriculture, also known as traditional agricultural systems, feed most of the poorest people in the world. These systems are of interest as they sometimes retain a level of integration with natural ecological systems greater than that of industrial agriculture, which may be more sustainable than some modern agricultural systems.
  • Urban agriculture
  • Vertical farming
• Production techniques (e.g., irrigation management, recommended nitrogen inputs)* Improving agricultural productivity in terms of quantity and quality (e.g., selection of drought-resistant crops and animals, development of new pesticides, yield-sensing technologies, simulation models of crop growth, in-vitro cell culture techniques)* Minimizing the effects of pests (weeds, insects, pathogens, nematodes) on crop or animal production systems.
• Transformation of primary products into end-consumer products (e.g., production, preservation, and packaging of dairy products)
• Prevention and correction of adverse environmental effects (e.g., soil degradation, waste management, bioremediation)
• Theoretical production ecology, relating to crop production modeling
• Food production and demand on a global basis, with special attention paid to the major producers, such as China, India, Brazil, the USA and the EU.
• Various sciences relating to agricultural resources and the environment (e.g. soil science, agroclimatology); biology of agricultural crops and animals (e.g. crop science, animal science and their included sciences, e.g. ruminant nutrition, farm animal welfare); such fields as agricultural economics and rural sociology; various disciplines encompassed in agricultural engineering.

• Agricultural biotechnology – studies ways to use scientific tools and techniques, including genetic engineering, molecular markers, molecular diagnostics, vaccines, and tissue culture, to modify living organisms: plants, animals, and microorganisms.^[1]
• Agronomy –
• Horticulture –
• Soil science –
• Animal husbandry –
• Agricultural engineering –
• Agricultural economics –
• Plant pathology –
• Entomology –

History of agricultural science

• History of fertilizer – Egyptians, Romans, Babylonians, and early Germans all are recorded as using minerals and/or manure to enhance the productivity of their farms. The use of wood ash as a field treatment became widespread. Today, the main form of fertilizer used globally is manufactured using the Haber process and the Ostwald process.
• History of genetics
  • History of Mendelian inheritance

• List of agricultural universities and colleges

• Wilbur Olin Atwater
• Robert Bakewell
• Norman Borlaug
• Luther Burbank
• George Washington Carver
• Carl Henry Clerk
• George C. Clerk
• René Dumont
• Sir Albert Howard
• Kailas Nath Kaul
• Thomas Lecky
• Justus von Liebig
• Jay Laurence Lush
• Gregor Mendel
• Louis Pasteur
• M. S. Swaminathan
• Jethro Tull
• Artturi Ilmari Virtanen
• Sewall Wright

• Outline of agriculture
• Globally Important Agricultural Heritage Systems