Boreal forests store a large fraction of global terrestrial carbon and are susceptible to environmental change, particularly rising temperatures and increased fire frequency. These changes have the potential to drive positive feedbacks between climate warming and the boreal carbon cycle. Because few studies have examined the warming response of boreal ecosystems recovering from fire, we establi...

Currently, characterization of soil microbial communities relies heavily on the use of molecular approaches. Independently of the approach used, soil DNA extraction is a crucial step, and success of downstream procedures will depend on how well DNA extraction was performed. Often, studies describing and comparing soil microbial communities are based on a single DNA extraction, which may not lea...

Meghalaya is a state of the north eastern region which is recognized as a treasure of many valuable minerals. Mining operations were left to the local miners to take up coal mining as cottage industries since most of the coal deposits are small and isolated and were not amenable for scientific mining to be conducted in the organized sector. The study of soil physical properties has been done be...

Horqin Sandy Land is a fragile, seriously desertified region located in Inner Mongolia of China. Overgrazing is one of the primary drivers of desertification in this region. We investigated whether the establishment of grazing exclosures in areas with active sand dunes enhances soil carbon (C) sequestration and benefits soil recovery. The results showed that soil organic C storage was 1.4, 1.9,...

The white-rot fungus Pleurotus ostreatus was able to degrade the polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) benzo[a]anthracene, chrysene, benzo[b]fluoranthene, benzo[k]fluoranthene, benzo[a]pyrene, dibenzo[a,h]anthracene, and benzo[ghi]perylene in nonsterile soil both in the presence and in the absence of cadmium and mercury. During 15 weeks of incubation, recovery of individual compounds was 16 t...

The effect of nitrogen (N) fertilizer on switchgrass biomass production has been evaluated in a number of locations on a small-plot scale; however, field-scale information regarding switchgrass response to N and N use efficiency (NUE) in different regions of the USA is limited. Switchgrass was planted in South Dakota (SD), New York (NY), Oklahoma (OK), and Virginia (VA) in 2008 and in Iowa (IA)...

Colloidal gas aphron dispersions (CGAs) can be described as a system of microbubbles suspended homogenously in a liquid matrix. This work examines the performance of CGAs in comparison to surfactant solutions for washing low levels of arsenic from an iron rich soil. Sodium Dodecyl Sulfate (SDS) and saponin, a biodegradable surfactant, obtained from Sapindus mukorossi or soapnut fruit were used ...

The Portuguese northern forests are often and severely affected by wildfires during the Summer season. These occurrences significantly affect and negatively impact all ecosystems, namely soil, fauna and flora. In order to reduce the occurrences of natural wildfires, some measures to control the availability of fuel mass are regularly implemented. Those preventive actions concern mainly prescrib...

Both soil nematodes and microorganisms have been shown to be sensitive bioindicators of soil recovery in metal-contaminated habitats; however, the underlying processes are poorly understood. We investigated the relationship among soil microbial community composition, nematode community structure and soil aluminum (Al) content in different vegetated aluminum-rich ecosystems. Our results demonstr...

The presence of ice in soil dramatically alters soil hydrologic and thermal properties. Despite this important role, many recent studies show that explicitly including the hydrologic effects of soil ice in land surface models degrades the simulation of runoff in cold regions. This paper addresses this dilemma by employing the Community Land Model version 2.0 (CLM2.0) developed at the National C...