Like bacteria, fungi play an important role in the soil ecosystem. As only a small fraction of the fungi present in soil can be cultured, conventional microbiological techniques yield only limited information on the composition and dynamics of fungal communities in soil. DNA-based methods do not depend on the culturability of microorganisms, and therefore they offer an attractive alternative fo...

This study focused on the impact of land-use changes and agricultural management of soybean in Amazon forest soils on the abundance and composition of the acidobacterial community. Quantitative real-time PCR (q-PCR) assays and pyrosequencing of 16S rRNA gene were applied to study the acidobacterial community in bulk soil samples from soybean croplands and adjacent native forests, and mesocosm s...

Pseudomonas fluorescens pc78 is an effective biocontrol agent for soil-borne fungal diseases. We previously constructed a P43-gfp tagged biocontrol bacteria P. fluorescens pc78-48 to investigate bacterial traits in natural ecosystem and the environmental risk of genetically modified biocontrol bacteria in tomato rhizosphere. Fluctuation of culturable bacteria profile, microbial community struct...

Enhanced biodegradation in the rhizosphere has been reported for many organic xenobiotic compounds, although the mechanisms are not fully understood. The purpose of this study was to discover whether rhizosphere-enhanced biodegradation is due to selective enrichment of degraders through growth on compounds produced by rhizodeposition. We monitored the mineralization of [U-(14)C]2,4-dichlorophen...

The study of heavy metal interactions with soils under specific climatic circumstances might lead to a better understanding migration and provide further information for local pollution control. In this work, we collected soil samples from the world's largest light rare earth mining district, Bayan Obo mine assessed content in at various depths. extraction effectiveness Diethylenetriaminepentaa...

Different fractions of Ni, Zn, Cu and Pb were determined in metal-spiked forest soils derived from four parent materials using three extractants (H2O, CaCl2 diethylenetriaminepentaacetic acid (DTPA)). It is important to determine how soil properties affect the retention these metals order predict their behavior act accordingly event accidental spillage, for example. The extraction was not seque...