Concept based mapping as a tool to disentangle biological properties and interactivities in research on growing media and hydroponics

The cascading use of valorized constituents from societal side-streams in growing media (GM), but also the reuse of growing media, has brought increased attention to their biological properties and processes. These processes are complex, dynamic and interconnected. They are a result of the origin and treatment in previous steps of the cascading use as well as in the re-use. Furthermore, they are affected by physical and chemical characteristics in the GM and in the environment that they are exposed to. Thus, the complexity of factors and events shapes the outcome of research studies as well as product development and the manner how such outcome may be interpreted and how manufacturing processes and product quality can be standardized. In addition, the recent development of high-throughput methods for culture independent description of microbial community composition, gathering a copious volume of data, increases the level of complexity even more. To draw clear-cut conclusions on biological characteristics, processes and dynamics in GM, this complex picture needs to be disentangled, a process that already has to be in place at the early step of the study, process or product design. Based on three examples, we describe the power of concept-based mapping to disentangle biological properties and interactivities in research and product development of GM and hydroponics and show its potential for big data analysis and modeling.