Development of artificial soil as an anatomical tool for understanding soil ecosystems

2015 Fiscal Year Final Research Report

• Project/Area Number: 25660047
• Research Category: Grant-in-Aid for Challenging Exploratory Research
• Allocation Type: Multi-year Fund
• Research Field: Plant nutrition/Soil science
• Research Institution: Nagoya University
• Principal Investigator: Murase Jun 名古屋大学, 生命農学研究科, 准教授 (30285241)
• Research Collaborator: MAEDA Yu 名古屋大学, 大学院生命農学研究科, 博士課程前期課程
• Project Period (FY): 2013-04-01 – 2016-03-31
• Keywords: 人工土壌 / 水田 / メタン生成 / 微生物 / 腐植物質

Outline of Final Research Achievements

Soil is the complex system consisting of inorganic substance (minerals, ions), organic substance (plant residue, humus), and biota including microorganisms. In this study, we developed an artificial soil as a tool to answer the fundamental questions "what is soil?". Our artificial soil was synthesized by combining different biotic and abitic elements composing rice field soil. The artificial soils with different combination of soil components were analyzed for the activity of anaerobic decomposition of organic matter. The study revealed that humic substances have a great impact on the activity of the artificial soil. Finally we succeeded in creating the artificial soil that shows a comparable activity to the original soil. The artificial soil and its recipe developed in this study would be useful to study the role of each component in soil functions.

Free Research Field

土壌微生物学