Antibiotics in the environment are a potential threat to environmental ecosystems as well as human health and safety. Antibiotics are designed to have a biological effect at low doses, and the low levels detected in the environment have turned focus on the need for more research on environmental occurrence and fate, to assess the risk and requirement for future regulation. This article describe...

Analysis of heavy metals in top soil samples from Nzoia sugarcane farms in Western Kenya found elevated levels of heavy metals in the soils with mean concentrations (mg kg⁻¹ dry weight) of 142.38, 59.12, 73.35, 116.27, 409.84 (dry season) and 144.22, 50.29, 72.14, 158.81, 368.83 (wet season) for Cr, Pb, Cu, Zn and Fe, respectively, compared with a control soil sample from an adjacent field wher...

In two glasshouse experiments, relations between sugarbeet root dry weight (y, expressed as a percentage of the maximum dry root weight), and preplanting populations of Heterodera schachtii (P(i)) were described by the equation y = 100(Z)(P(i)-T), in which Z = a constant slightly smaller than 1, and T = the tolerance limit (the value of P(i) below which damage was not measureable). T varied wit...

Earthworms play key roles in soils and sub-lethal effects of environmental toxicants on these organisms should be taken seriously, since they might have detrimental effects on higher ecological levels. In laboratory experiments we have assessed sub-lethal effects (body mass change and cast production) of imidacloprid on two earthworm species commonly found in different agricultural soils (Lumbr...

The potential for non-point-source pollution of surface waters from agricultural lands continues to be a concern. Our objective was to determine the effect of surface residue management and fertilizer application timing in regards to soil moisture conditions on nutrient losses in runoff. Studies were conducted using a rainfall simulator that applied 125 mm h-1 for 3 h to an Austin (Udorthentic ...

Alfalfa (Medicago sativa L.) production is dramatically reduced in acidic, Al-rich soil. Transgenic plants of several species overexpressing organic acid synthesis and/or organic acid transporter genes have shown enhanced tolerance to Al. The objective of this research was to evaluate the effect of the citrate synthase (CS) and the Daucus carota L. plasma membrane H+-transporting adenosine trip...

A long-term experiment was carried out under field conditions in Jaboticabal, SP, Brazil, with the objective of evaluating the concentration of Ba in soil and in maize plants grown in a soil treated with sewage sludge for nine consecutive years. During 2005/2006, maize was used as test plants and the experimental design was in randomized complete blocks with four treatments and five replicates....

Flooded rice paddy soils represent a typical anaerobic freshwater habitat of microorganisms. The abundance and community structure of sulfate reducing prokaryotes (SRP) were investigated in order to understand their response to different fertilization practices in rice paddy, including control without fertilizers (CT) and arrangements of different chemical fertilizers of nitrogen (N), phosphoru...