BACKGROUND AND AIMS High Al resistance of Rumex obtusifolius together with its ability to accumulate Al has never been studied in weakly acidic conditions (pH > 5.8) and is not sufficiently described in real soil conditions. The potential elucidation of the role of organic acids in plant can explain the Al tolerance mechanism. METHODS We established a pot experiment with R. obtusifolius plant...

Uranium contamination of soils and sediments often originates from acidic or alkaline waste sources, with diffusion being a major transport mechanism. Measurements of U(VI) diffusion from initially pH 2 and pH 11 solutions into a slightly alkaline Altamont soil and a neutral Oak Ridge soil were obtained through monitoring uptake from boundary reservoirs and from U concentration profiles within ...

Vegetation at mining sites can produce increased heavy metal leaching by the organic acids and protons originating from root secretion and litter degradation. Batch experiments were conducted to investigate the effects of organic acids and pH on the extraction of Pb, Cd, Zn and Cu from an alkaline mine soil (sampled from a mining site of Chenzhou City, Hunan Province) and an acid mine soil (sam...

In order to investigate whether microbial biomass and its residues are nutrient and energy sources for humivorous beetle larvae, we carried out feeding trials using soil supplemented with C-labeled fungal biomass (Penicillium chrysogenum), bacterial biomass (Bacillus megaterium), fungal or bacterial structural polysaccharide (chitin, peptidoglycan), bacterial protein, or cellulose, taking the l...

General guidelines to reclaim saline or sodic soils do not adequately consider variables such as pH and the presence of organic matter that are known to affect soil stability. Poor structural stability of sodic, saline-sodic, and high-pH soils adversely influences crop yields; promotes piping, tunneling, and slope erosion; and can accelerate the failure of water conveyance systems. We evaluated...

Soil enzyme activities are widely utilized as rapid and sensitive indicators in discriminating among soil management effects. The objective of the present study was to compare the influence of conservation tillage, i.e. direct drilling (DD) (residue cover is left on the soil surface) v. conventional tillage (CT), on soil chemical and biochemical properties in a crop rotation (cereals–sunflower–...

In soil, bioavailable inorganic orthophosphate is found at low concentrations and thus limits biological growth. To overcome this phosphorus scarcity, plants and bacteria secrete numerous enzymes, namely acid and alkaline phosphatases, which cleave orthophosphate from various organic phosphorus substrates. Using profile hidden Markov modeling approaches, we investigated the abundance of various...

The lipase producing bacteria were screened from the soil both qualitatively by Tween 80, rhodamine B agar assays and quantitatively by titrimetry with the objective of finding a bacterial strain capable of producing an alkaline lipase. The higher lipolytic activity of 17.43 U/ml was recorded for the isolate L13. Traditional methods viz. morphological, cultural and biochemical characteristics w...

A pot experiment was performed to study the effectiveness of remediation using different plant species and the enzyme response involved in remediating PAH-contaminated soil. The study indicated that species Echinacea purpurea, Festuca arundinacea Schred, Fire Phoenix (a combined F. arundinacea), and Medicago sativa L. possess the potential for remediation in PAH-contaminated soils. The study al...

Dicyandiamide (DCD) and 3, 4-dimethypyrazole phosphate (DMPP) are often claimed to be efficient in regulating soil N transformations and influencing plant productivity, but the difference of their performances across field sites is less clear. Here we applied a meta-analysis approach to compare effectiveness of DCD and DMPP across field trials. Our results showed that DCD and DMPP were equally ...