Bioaugmentation of Soil Contaminated with Azoxystrobin

The presence of fungicides in the natural environment, either resulting from deliberate actions or not, has become a serious threat to many ecosystems, including soil. This can be prevented by taking appropriate measures to clear the environment of organic contamination, including fungicides. Therefore, a study was conducted aimed at determining the effect of bioaugmentation of soil exposed to azoxystrobin on its degradation and activity of selected enzymes (dehydrogenases, catalase, urease, acidic phosphatase, alkaline phosphatase). A model experiment was conducted for 90 days on two types of soil: loamy sand (pHKCl-5.6) and sandy loam (pHKCl-7.0), which were contaminated by azoxystrobin at 22.50 mg kg-1 DM of soil and inoculated with a specific consortium of microorganisms. Four strains of bacteria were used in the experiment (Bacillus sp. LM655314.1, B. cereus KC848897.1, B. weihenstephanensis KF831381.1, B. megaterium KJ843149.1) and two strains of mould fungi (Aphanoascus terreus AB861677.1, A. fulvescens JN943451.1). Inoculation of soil with the consortium of microorganisms accelerated the degradation of azoxystrobin. The isolated microorganisms were more active in loamy sand because within 90 days azoxystrobin was degraded by 24% (Bacillus sp., B. cereus, B. weihenstephanensis, B. megaterium) to 78% (Aphanoascus terreus, A. fulvescens). In sandy loam, azoxystrobin was degraded by 9% (Aphanoascus terreus, A. fulvescens) to 29% (Bacillus sp., B. cereus, B. weihenstephanensis, B. megaterium and Aphanoascus terreus, A. fulvescens). The activity of soil enzymes was also changed as a result of inoculation of soil with microorganisms. The activity of all of the enzymes under study was found to have increased when soil augmentation was performed.