Soil Fungi May Help in Lead Remediation Lead contaminates soil in many urban areas. Investigators have discovered that lead can be transformed by multiple soil fungi into a stable form known as chloropyromorphite, suggesting a potential new tool for cleaning up soil lead contamination. This ability of the fungi may help them to survive in contaminated locations. The authors write that “fungal m...

Endosulfan is a broad-spectrum cyclodiene insecticide that has been used extensively for over 30 years on a variety of crops. It is a mixture of two stereoisomers, a and b endosulfan, in a ratio of 7 : 3. Its toxicity is extremely high against fish and aquatic invertebrates, and it has increasingly been implicated in mammalian gonadal toxicity, genotoxicity and neurotoxicity; however, endosulfa...

Symbioses may be important mechanisms of plant adaptation to their environment. We conducted a reciprocal inoculation experiment to test the hypothesis that soil fertility is a key driver of local adaptation in arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) symbioses. Ecotypes of Andropogon gerardii from phosphorus-limited and nitrogen-limited grasslands were grown with all possible "home and away" combinations o...

Small-scale heterogeneity of abiotic and biotic factors is expected to play a crucial role in species coexistence. It is known that plants are able to concentrate their root biomass into areas with high nutrient content and also acquire nutrients via symbiotic microorganisms such as arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi. At the same time, little is known about the small-scale distribution of soil n...

INTRODUCTION INTRODUCTION Due to the specific work environment, farmers are exposed to various biological occupational hazard. Among these factors significant are fungi present in the grain and also in the soil. The fungi may be the cause of human diseases including skin infections, asthma, allergic rhinitis and many others. AIM The aim of this study was to quantify and identify species of...

Bacillus spp. are well known to protect plants from seed or soil-borne pathogens by the synthesis of various metabolites with antimicrobial activity, such as hy?drolytic enzymes and antibiotics. This study aimed select most effective a group ten antagonistic strains antifungal activity assay. were primarily isolated soil identified B. safensis, pumilus subtilis 16S rDNA sequencing. The four ana...

Defining sustainable agricultural practices requires an understanding of both aboveand below-ground consequences to management strategies. While alternatives to biocides are sought for the control of weeds, insects and pathogens, biocide use will continue with the goal of reducing quantities used in an integrated approach. The impact of three fungicides on plant growth, seed yield, seed nutrien...

Sorosphaera viticola is a soil-borne, endophytic parasite of grapevine. It is classifi ed within the plasmodiophorids, an enigmatic group of obligate biotrophic parasites of higher plants. Sorosphaera viticola has been found abundantly in the roots of Vitis spp. in Germany and Canada. This may indicate a global distribution of this root parasite. But its biphasic life-cycle, its soil-borne natu...