“Where you have a large area of contaminated land it is often very hard for plants or soil microbes to regrow, leading to reduced carbon sequestration which adds to climate change. Researchers are currently working on specially-adapted trees, grasses and soil microbes which can be used to recover these sites, devastated by historic industrial and mining activities – but there is a need to speed up national efforts to adopt such solutions, he adds.

Source: Climate ups risk of toxic harm (Science Alert)

Crop Physiology and Production Center (CPPC), National Key Laboratory of Crop Genetic Improvement, MOA Key Laboratory of Crop Physiology, Ecology and Cultivation (The Middle Reaches of Yangtze River), Huazhong Agricultural University, Hubei, Wuhan 430070, China

Received 21 October 2011; Accepted 13 December 2011

Academic Editors: S. S. Phartyal and E. Porceddu

Poor seed germination and early seedling growth associated with urea-induced soil ammonia volatilization are major constraints in the adoption of dry direct-seeded rice. To directly examine soil ammonia volatilization and its damage to seed germination and early seedling growth of dry direct-seeded rice when urea is applied at seeding, two Petri-dish incubation experiments and a field experiment were conducted. Ammonia volatilization due to urea application significantly reduced seed germination and early seedling growth of dry direct-seedling rice. NBPT significantly reduced ammonia volatilization following urea application. The application of ammonium sulfate, instead of urea at seeding, may mitigate poor crop establishment of dry direct-seeded rice. Root growth of dry direct-seeded rice was more seriously inhibited by soil ammonia volatilization than that of shoot. Results suggest that roots are more sensitive to soil ammonia toxicity than shoots in dry direct-seeded rice system when N is applied as urea at seeding.

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