(Press-News.org) FAYETTEVILLE, Ark. — After several years of research, the results are in on the difference in turfgrass soil surfactants that are marketed as “penetrants” and “retainers.”
Mike Richardson, professor of horticulture with the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station, says putting greens built to United States Golf Association standards with 12-inch-deep sand root zones require meticulous water management to promote both plant health and playability. Among the most important tools for managing water in putting greens are soil surfactants, often called wetting agents.
Despite their critical role in turf maintenance and because they aren’t pest management tools, wetting agents do not go through the same federal registration and labeling process as herbicides, fungicides, or insecticides, resulting in less research data about what they are and how they work. In the absence of such data, marketing terminology such as “penetrant” or “retainer,” along with anecdotal evidence, have been used instead, Richardson explained.
To help clear up the confusion, a study by turfgrass scientists with the experiment station, the research arm of the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture, and the Dale Bumpers College of Agricultural, Food and Life Sciences at the University of Arkansas, was recently published by the American Society for Testing and Materials. Co-authors of the study include researchers at Texas Tech University, The Ohio State University and Pennsylvania State University.
The study titled “Penetrants Versus Retainers: Comparing Soil Surfactant Terminology to Performance in Sand-Based Putting Greens” found that differences between soil surfactants marketed as “penetrants” or “retainers” were inconsistent, if present at all. It was published in the ASTM “Pesticide Formulation and Delivery Systems” 43rd Volume.” ASTM stands for Advancing Standards Transforming Markets.
Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station turfgrass researchers led by Doug Karcher began looking at wetting agent products marketed as “penetrants” and “retainers” in 2017. Karcher, now the horticulture and crop science department chair at The Ohio State University, was assisted by Daniel O’Brien, Ph.D., as a graduate student. O’Brien carried on the work as a Ph.D. student while in Arkansas and served as the lead author of the recently published study. He now works for U.S. Golf Association as a Green Section Research Manager.
The study was supported by the Golf Course Superintendents Association of America.
As part of their investigation, the researchers compared turfgrass soil surfactants marketed as penetrants to those marketed as retainers for their ability to affect rootzone volumetric water content and surface firmness. Volumetric water content, a measurement of how much water a given volume of soil contains, is especially important in sand-based putting greens with their limited water-holding capacity.
Multiple studies were conducted on sand-based putting greens in Fayetteville from 2018 to 2021, and Lubbock, Texas, from 2019 to 2020. The studies included the turfgrass species creeping bentgrass and ultradwarf bermudagrass.
Soil surfactant treatments were applied according to label recommendations and evaluated over a range of rootzone moisture conditions. Volumetric water content was measured at multiple depths using portable moisture meters and surface firmness was assessed through multiple methods.
At the Fayetteville location, during 2018 to 2019, there were no significant differences in volumetric water content between penetrants and retainers on any date or at any depth. In 2021, both penetrants and retainers could produce volumetric water content greater than nontreated controls. Likewise, both product types also resulted in volumetric water content less than nontreated controls. Similar inconsistencies were documented at the Lubbock location.
Collectively, the results reinforced the need to establish soil surfactant classifications based on performance data from field testing rather than marketing terminology, the study concluded.
Co-authors included Joseph Young, associate professor of turfgrass science at Texas Tech University, Michael Fidanza, professor of plant and soil sciences at Pennsylvania State University, and Stanley Kostka, a visiting scholar at PSU.
To learn more about the Division of Agriculture research, visit the Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station website. Follow us on X at @ArkAgResearch, subscribe to the Food, Farms and Forests podcast and sign up for our monthly newsletter, the Arkansas Agricultural Research Report. To learn more about the Division of Agriculture, visit uada.edu. Follow us on X at @AgInArk. To learn about extension programs in Arkansas, contact your local Cooperative Extension Service agent or visit uaex.uada.edu.
About the Division of Agriculture
The University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture’s mission is to strengthen agriculture, communities, and families by connecting trusted research to the adoption of best practices. Through the Agricultural Experiment Station and the Cooperative Extension Service, the Division of Agriculture conducts research and extension work within the nation’s historic land grant education system.
The Division of Agriculture is one of 20 entities within the University of Arkansas System. It has offices in all 75 counties in Arkansas and faculty on three system campuses.
Pursuant to 7 CFR § 15.3, the University of Arkansas System Division of Agriculture offers all its Extension and Research programs and services (including employment) without regard to race, color, sex, national origin, religion, age, disability, marital or veteran status, genetic information, sexual preference, pregnancy or any other legally protected status, and is an equal opportunity institution.
# # #
Media Contact: John Lovett
U of A System Division of Agriculture
Arkansas Agricultural Experiment Station
(479) 763-5929
jlovett@uada.edu
END
Vanderbilt University Medical Center researchers have developed a groundbreaking new method for the recovery of hearts from deceased organ donors after circulatory death (DCD). The method (rapid recovery with extended ultra-oxygenated preservation [REUP]), which involves flushing the donor heart with a cold oxygenated preservation solution after death, avoids the disadvantages of two existing preservation methods, both of which reanimate the heart, one that has ethical questions and another that is expensive.
The former method known as normothermic regional perfusion (NRP) involves reanimating the heart in the deceased donor’s body, which some have ethical concerns about and is ...
The National Center for Supercomputing Applications is lending its expertise and institutional supercomputing knowledge to assist Georgia Tech in building and operating a new artificial intelligence-centered supercomputer.
Nexus, a next-generation, national-scale computational resource, will integrate cutting-edge heterogeneous hardware, AI-accelerated computing and advanced software services to unify scientific and engineering research workflows for researchers throughout the country.
“Hosting Nexus signals that Georgia Tech is ready ...
The Baltic ringed seal population has increased fivefold since the 1970s when long-term overhunting and environmental toxins endangered the future of the species. A new statistical model now revises the population estimate.
Since its lowest point in the 1970s, the Baltic ringed seal population has grown from around 5,000 to 25,000 individuals. Behind this increase are hunting bans and the phasing out of environmentally hazardous substances such as PCB and DDT. The decline in environmental toxins has allowed the reproductive ...
The UK’s pioneering licensed IVF technique to reduce the risk of mitochondrial diseases carried out in Newcastle has seen eight babies born, published research shows.
All eight babies show no signs of having mitochondrial DNA disease. The babies, four girls and four boys, including one set of identical twins, were born to seven women at high risk of transmitting serious disease caused by mutations in mitochondrial DNA. The findings, reported today by the Newcastle team who pioneered mitochondrial donation using fertilised human eggs, indicate that the new treatment, known as pronuclear transfer, is effective in reducing the risk of otherwise incurable mitochondrial DNA ...
A new treatment that uses music therapy on dementia wards could improve care and support for some of the NHS’s most vulnerable patients.
Researchers at Anglia Ruskin University (ARU) and Cambridgeshire and Peterborough NHS Foundation Trust have piloted a music therapy approach called MELODIC, across two NHS dementia wards.
More alternatives to psychotropic medication are needed to support dementia patients who experience severe distress.
The pilot study involved a music therapist being embedded on hospital wards, the ...
CHICAGO—July 16, 2025—The American Ornithological Society (AOS) is pleased to announce the grantees of the 2025 Kessel Fellowships for Ornithological Research and Latin American/Caribbean Conservation Research Grants for early-career researchers.
The AOS Kessel Fellowship funding supports the full range of ornithological research by early-career scientists currently published in peer-reviewed journals, such as avian biology, ecology, behavior, conservation, genetics, and interdisciplinary work. One arctic research Kessel Fellowship of $30,000 was awarded to Dr. Teresa Pegan; and five individual $15,000 fellowships were awarded to Drs. Vitek ...
COLUMBUS, Ohio – In utero exposure to two liquid ingredients in e-cigarettes – minus the nicotine that drives addiction – can alter skull shape during fetal development, a new study in mice has found.
In a series of experiments, pregnant mice were exposed to a combination of two liquids used to create vaping’s throat hit and smoke plume. Compared to two other experimental conditions, the offspring of mothers exposed to a specific ratio of these compounds weighed less and were born with narrowed facial features and shortened skulls.
The ...
Two world-famous Arizona attractions – the Grand Canyon and Meteor Crater Natural Landmark – may share a hidden connection, according to new research from the University of Arizona and the University of New Mexico.
Published in the journal Geology, an international research team presents the results of an intriguing "detective story" that has played out over several decades and across scientific disciplines: the meteorite impact just west of Winslow, Arizona, that created Meteor Crater about 56,000 years ago ...
ANN ARBOR, Mich. – Newborns exposed to HIV during pregnancy or birth should receive preventive antiretroviral medication immediately after delivery to reduce the risk of transmission from mother to child.
But a study finds that more than half of infants diagnosed with HIV in their first year of life had not received this essential postnatal treatment — suggesting their mothers’ infections may not have been detected during pregnancy.
The study also highlights racial disparities in HIV exposure, infection and treatment: The majority of infants who had not been treated for an HIV infection after birth were Black, according ...
Probiotics are emerging tools used by neonatal intensive care units to promote healthy outcomes and prevent intestinal diseases such as necrotizing enterocolitis. Approximately one in ten of the youngest preterm infants in the U.S. are treated with probiotics, and studies show that this therapy can reduce all causes of mortality.
Probiotic treatment often includes the administration of bacterial strains that belong to the Bifidobacterium genus. Bifidobacterium strains are especially abundant in the guts of children — particularly children who are breastfed — and are considered beneficial ...
