A major challenge in plant ecology is quantifying how roots interact with the soil to obtain water and nutrients. Stable isotope analysis of hydrogen and oxygen bound in plant and soil water is one of the best and least destructive methods for elucidating plant-soil interactions. Plant roots obtain water from various depths in the soil and the isotopic signature of plant stem water reflects the...

To compensate for stress imposed by salinity, biofilm formation and exopolysaccharide production are significant strategies of salt tolerant bacteria to assist metabolism. We hypothesized that two previously isolated salt-tolerant strains Halomonas variabilis (HT1) and Planococcus rifietoensis (RT4) have an ability to improve plant growth, These strains can form biofilm and accumulate exopolysa...

Climate change is expected to increase future abiotic stresses on ecosystems through extreme weather events leading to more extreme drought and rainfall incidences [Jentsch A, et al. (2007) Front Ecol Environ 5(7):365-374]. These fluctuations in precipitation may affect soil biota, soil processes [Evans ST, Wallenstein MD (2012) Biogeochemistry 109:101-116], and the proportion of exotics in inv...

For most of history, few things have mattered more to human communities than their relations with soil, because soil provided most of their food and nutrients. Accordingly, some of the earliest written documents were agricultural manuals intended to organize, preserve, and impart soil knowledge. Indeed, ancient civilizations often worshipped the soil as the foundry of life itself. For the past ...

7 Chapter Soil factors are an important consideration for successful wildland range development or improvement programs. Even though many soil improvement and amelioration practices are not realistic for wildlands, their evaluation is an important step in selection of adapted plant materials for revegetation. This chapter presents information for wildland managers on: the importance of soils ph...

Many investigations across natural and artificial plant diversity gradients have reported that both soil physicochemical factors and plant community composition affect soil microbial communities. To test the effect of plant diversity loss on soil bacterial communities, we conducted a five-year plant functional group removal experiment in a steppe ecosystem in Inner Mongolia (China). We found th...

Soil respiration is responsible for recycling considerable quantities of carbon from terrestrial ecosystems to the atmosphere. There is a growing body of evidence that suggests that the richness of plants in a community can have significant impacts on ecosystem functioning, but the specific influences of plant species richness (SR), plant functional-type richness and plant community composition...

While several studies have shown that invasive plant effects on soil biota influence subsequent plant performance, corresponding studies on how invasive animals affect plants through influencing soil biota are lacking. This is despite the fact that invasive animals often indirectly alter the below-ground subsystem. We studied 18 offshore islands in northern New Zealand, half of which have been ...

in this research, the effect of using vermicompost on growth rate, fertility and characteristics oftomatoes has been studied. four vermicompost: soil mixture were supplied with ratios of 1:1, 1:2, 1:3, and 1:4 and also four different beds were provided. total of 24 small globe tomato plants were tested and in each bed combination, six tomato plants were embedded. rate of growth and yielding of ...

Understanding microbial partnerships with the medicinally and economically important crop Cannabis has the potential to affect agricultural practice by improving plant fitness and production yield. Furthermore, Cannabis presents an interesting model to explore plant-microbiome interactions as it produces numerous secondary metabolic compounds. Here we present the first description of the endorh...