In many parts of the world food security is at risk. One of the biophysical root causes of falling per-capita food production is the declining quality and quantity of soils. To reverse this trend and increase soil fertility soil and plant nutrients have to be replenished. This review provides a literature survey of experiences of using multi-nutrient rock fertilizers for soil fertility enhancem...

Urine contains about 50 % of the phosphorus (P) and about 90 % of the nitrogen (N) excreted by humans and is therefore an interesting substrate for nutrient recovery. Source-separated urine can be used to precipitate struvite or, through a newly developed technology, nitrified urine fertilizer (NUF). In this study, we prepared (33)P radioisotope- and stable (15)N isotope-labeled synthetic NUF (...

Smart Fertilizers In article number 2100113, Jong-Rok Jeon and co-workers fabricate a supramolecular assembly of lignin ferric ions on the surface hydroxyapatite through one-step one-pot process. The as-prepared particles show co-release crop nutrients stimulants in response to root-derived organic acids. This responsiveness results enhanced growth crops under abiotic stresses.

Sustainable agriculture, which is characterized by farming profitably while minimizing damage to the environment, is not easy to practice. “Conventional” agriculture in the USA is commonly considered to involve practices that have potential to damage the environment. These include tilling the soil excessively, overapplying readily soluble inorganic fertilizers (“chemical fertilizers”), and over...

Phosphorus is an essential element for every living organism, but when it exceeds certain limit in water bodies, it will cause serious environmental issues, such as eutrophication. P accumulation in water bodies can be caused by non-point sources, such as agriculture land runoff, as well as from point sources such as wastewater effluent discharges. In order to avoid eutrophication of water bodi...

In response to addressing potassium (K) deficiency in soil and decreasing agricultural production costs, the potential of K-bearing phyllosilicate minerals that can be directly used as an alternative K source has been investigated using sodium tetraphenylboron (NaTPB) extraction and an intensive cropping experiment. The results showed that the critical value of K-release rate and leaf K concent...

An inductively coupled plasma atomic emission spectrometry (ICP-AES) method was developed for the determination of phosphorus in fertilizers. Total phosphorus, direct extraction available phosphorus (EDTA), and water-soluble phosphorus, reported as phosphorus pentoxide (P205), in 15 Magruder check fertilizers were measured by ICP-AES, and the results were compared with those obtained by the AOA...

Nitrogen fertilizer use in Wisconsin as anhydrous ammonia, urea-ammonium nitrate solutions, and urea ranged from about 148,000 to 213, 000 tons of N during the 19952000 period (Terry and Kirby, 2001). This amount is similar to that used about 10 years earlier when 170,000 tons of N was used in 1984. However, a substantial materials shift has occurred since 1984 when about 56% of the N used as t...

Field experiments were conducted to study the effect of organic matrix based slow release fertilizers (SRFs) on plant growth, nitrate assimilation and seed yield of Brassica juncea L. cv, pusa bold. The agro-waste materials like cow dung, clay soil, neem leaves and rice bran were mixed together in 2:2:1:1 ratio and used as organic matrix for the immobilization of chemical fertilizer nutrients w...

urea is the most common form of nitrogen fertilizer used in sugar beet cultivation. urea has a high solubility and its losses are high and consequently its efficiency is low. it is supposed that urea solubility can be limited and its efficiency can be increased by using slow-release nitrogen fertilizers. by conducting an experiment in three important sugar beet cultivation areas of khorasan pro...