Digital Commons Network^™

Evaluation Of Novel Litter Amendments For Use In The Commercial Broiler Industry, Jorge A. Urrutia

Theses and Dissertations

Poultry litter amendments (LA) are commonly used to maintain good litter quality; the most common ones; are acidifiers. However, concern over the lifespan of LA acidifiers (d) and corrosive nature revealed a need for alternative LA. Products of interest include biochar (BC), superabsorbent polymers (SAPs), and alum mud (AM). Experiment 1 was a screening study (n=17 treatments, no birds) conducted to determine the optimal application rate/method of BC, SAPs, and AM vs.commercial LA and a control. Most SAPs treatments measured metrics may be similar (i.e., bacteria, water activity) or better (pH) vs. commercial LA (PLT). High inclusions of novel LA …

Simple Organic Fertilizer Amendments For Farming In Degraded Soils: Effects On Plant-Microbe Interactions, Andrew Adamski

All NMU Master's Theses

The rapid loss of topsoil, biodiversity, and water quality across agricultural land in the United States and the industrialized world poses some of the most important risks to the future of global and domestic food security. Not only is arable land being lost at an unsustainable pace, but the average age of farmers has also steadily been rising due to a myriad of barriers young, BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color), and beginning farmers face. In an attempt to address these issues, worm castings, bokashi tea, fish hydrolysate, and biochar were applied alone and in combination to an extremely …

Microbial Labilization And Diversification Of Pyrogenic Dissolved Organic Matter, Aleksandar I. Goranov, Andrew S. Wozniak, Kyle W. Bostick, Andrew R. Zimmerman, Siddhartha Mitra, Patrick G. Hatcher

Chemistry & Biochemistry Faculty Publications

With the increased occurrence of wildfires around the world, interest in the chemistry of pyrogenic organic matter (pyOM) and its fate in the environment has increased. Upon leaching from soils by rain events, significant amounts of dissolved pyOM (pyDOM) enter the aquatic environment and interact with microbial communities that are essential for cycling organic matter within the different biogeochemical cycles. To evaluate the biodegradability of pyDOM, aqueous extracts of laboratory-produced biochars were incubated with soil microbes, and the molecular changes to the composition of pyDOM were probed using ultrahigh-resolution mass spectrometry (Fourier transform–ion cyclotron resonance–mass spectrometry). Given that solar irradiation …

Ozonized Biochar Filtrate Effects On The Growth Of Pseudomonas Putida And Cyanobacteria Synechococcus Elongatus Pcc 7942, Oumar Sacko, Nancy L. Engle, Timothy J. Tschaplinski, Sandeep Kumar, James Weifu Lee

Chemistry & Biochemistry Faculty Publications

Background

Biochar ozonization was previously shown to dramatically increase its cation exchange capacity, thus improving its nutrient retention capacity. The potential soil application of ozonized biochar warrants the need for a toxicity study that investigates its effects on microorganisms.

Results

In the study presented here, we found that the filtrates collected from ozonized pine 400 biochar and ozonized rogue biochar did not have any inhibitory effects on the soil environmental bacteria Pseudomonas putida, even at high dissolved organic carbon (DOC) concentrations of 300 ppm. However, the growth of Synechococcus elongatus PCC 7942 was inhibited by the ozonized biochar filtrates at …

Microbial Communities And Nitrogen Dynamics In Prairie And Cropland Soils, Bikram Kumar Das

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Soil microbial communities are affected by many factors, such as soil nitrogen (N) and the quantity of grass-root exudates, changing seasons, fertilization method, plant diversity, and their origin. This holds for both natural and fertilized soils. This research was intended to expand the current understanding of soil microbial interactions associated with ecological functions. The objectives of the research were (I) to characterize prokaryotic soil communities, estimate functional potential, and quantify nitrogen cycle-associated prokaryotic gene expressions across three phases of the growing season, (II) to explore the diazotrophic community composition in a natural system using nifH sequencing as well as 16S …