Soil organic matter fractions and microaggregation in a Ultisol under cultivation and secondary forest in south-eastern Nigeria

Soil Research ◽  
2006 ◽  
Vol 44 (6) ◽  
pp. 627 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. A. Igwe ◽  
D. Nwokocha

The study of the role of soil organic carbon (SOC) in restoration of soil fertility and stability of soil microaggregates is of importance in soils that degrade rapidly. We studied 4 profiles in a Ultisol under secondary forest and cultivation to identify the SOC microaggregate-associated fractions and their roles in microaggregate stability. The soils are coarse-textured, deep, and low in soil nutrients and SOC, probably due to high rates of mineralisation. Microaggregate-associated SOC was also low with most of the SOC protected by the <63 µm fractions. Clay content was negatively correlated with <2, 63–2, and <63 µm associated SOC (r = –0.45*, –0.42*, –0.40*, respectively). Clay flocculation index and clay dispersion ratio were significantly correlated with <2 and 63–2 µm associated SOC, while water-stable aggregates <0.25 mm were negatively correlated with all SOC fractions determined. Principal component analysis revealed that SOC fractions associated with 2000–63 µm aggregate sizes were the SOC fractions that best explained the variance in aggregated silt + clay, indicating their contribution to microaggregate stability. This was attributed perhaps to the production of polysaccharides and materials released by microbial activities from this recently deposited or incompletely decomposed SOC. The other soil properties that in addition to SOC contributed to either dispersion or microaggregate stability of these soils were exchangeable Na+, Mg2+, and CEC.

2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (04) ◽  
Author(s):  
MINAKSHI SERAWAT ◽  
V K PHOGAT ◽  
ANIL Abdul KAPOOR ◽  
VIJAY KANT SINGH ◽  
ASHA SERAWAT

Soil crust strength influences seedling emergence, penetration and morphology of plant roots, and, consequently, crop yields. A study was carried out to assess the role of different soil properties on crust strength atHisar, Haryana, India. The soil samples from 0-5 and 5-15 cm depths were collected from 21 locations from farmer’s fields, having a wide range of texture.Soil propertieswere evaluated in the laboratory and theirinfluence on the modulus of rupture (MOR), which is the measure of crust strength, was evaluated.The MOR of texturally different soils was significantly correlated with saturated hydraulic conductivity at both the depths. Dispersion ratio was found to decrease with an increase in fineness of the texture of soil and the lowest value was recorded in silty clay loam soil,which decreased with depth. The modulus of rupture was significantly negatively correlative with the dispersion ratio.There was no role of calcium carbonate in influencing the values of MOR of soils. Similarly,the influence of pH, EC and SAR of soil solution on MOR was non-significant.A perusal of thevalues of the correlations between MOR and different soil properties showed that the MOR of soils of Haryana are positively correlated with silt + clay (r = 0.805) followed by water-stable aggregates (r = 0.774), organic carbon (r = 0.738), silt (r = 0.711), mean weight diameter (r = 0.608) and clay (r = 0.593) while negatively correlated with dispersion ratio (r = - 0.872), sand (r = -0.801) and hydraulic conductivity (r = -0.752) of soils.


Pathogens ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 10 (5) ◽  
pp. 543
Author(s):  
Sergio Gastón Caspe ◽  
Javier Palarea-Albaladejo ◽  
Clare Underwood ◽  
Morag Livingstone ◽  
Sean Ranjan Wattegedera ◽  
...  

Chlamydia abortus infects livestock species worldwide and is the cause of enzootic abortion of ewes (EAE). In Europe, control of the disease is achieved using a live vaccine based on C. abortus 1B strain. Although the vaccine has been useful for controlling disease outbreaks, abortion events due to the vaccine have been reported. Recently, placental pathology resulting from a vaccine type strain (vt) infection has been reported and shown to be similar to that resulting from a natural wild-type (wt) infection. The aim of this study was to extend these observations by comparing the distribution and severity of the lesions, the composition of the predominating cell infiltrate, the amount of bacteria present and the role of the blood supply in infection. A novel system for grading the histological and pathological features present was developed and the resulting multi-parameter data were statistically transformed for exploration and visualisation through a tailored principal component analysis (PCA) to evaluate the difference between them. The analysis provided no evidence of meaningful differences between vt and wt strains in terms of the measured pathological parameters. The study also contributes a novel methodology for analysing the progression of infection in the placenta for other abortifacient pathogens.


Human Ecology ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam Pain ◽  
Kristina Marquardt ◽  
Dil Khatri

AbstractWe provide an analytical contrast of the dynamics of secondary forest regeneration in Nepal and Peru framed by a set of common themes: land access, boundaries, territories, and rights, seemingly more secure in Nepal than Peru; processes of agrarian change and their consequences for forest-agriculture interactions and the role of secondary forest in the landscape, more marked in Peru, where San Martín is experiencing apparent agricultural intensification, than in Nepal; and finally processes of social differentiation that have consequences for different social groups, livelihood construction and their engagement with trees, common to both countries. These themes address the broader issue of the necessary conditions for secondary forest regeneration and the extent to which the rights and livelihood benefits of those actively managing it are secured.


2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sung-Yoon Kang ◽  
Hyojung Kim ◽  
Sungwon Jung ◽  
Sang Min Lee ◽  
Sang Pyo Lee

Abstract Background The microbiota of the lower respiratory tract in patients with non-tuberculous mycobacterial pulmonary disease (NTM-PD) has not been fully evaluated. We explored the role of the lung microbiota in NTM-PD by analyzing protected specimen brushing (PSB) and bronchial washing samples from patients with NTM-PD obtained using a flexible bronchoscope. Results Bronchial washing and PSB samples from the NTM-PD group tended to have fewer OTUs and lower Chao1 richness values compared with those from the control group. In both bronchial washing and PSB samples, beta diversity was significantly lower in the NTM-PD group than in the control group (P = 2.25E-6 and P = 4.13E-4, respectively). Principal component analysis showed that the PSBs and bronchial washings exhibited similar patterns within each group but differed between the two groups. The volcano plots indicated differences in several phyla and genera between the two groups. Conclusions The lower respiratory tract of patients with NTM-PD has a unique microbiota distribution that is low in richness/diversity.


2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (14) ◽  
pp. 7430
Author(s):  
Hiromi Sato ◽  
Ayaka Shimizu ◽  
Toya Okawa ◽  
Miaki Uzu ◽  
Momoko Goto ◽  
...  

The role of astrocytes in the periphery of metastatic brain tumors is unclear. Since astrocytes regulate central nervous metabolism, we hypothesized that changes in astrocytes induced by contact with cancer cells would appear in the metabolome of both cells and contribute to malignant transformation. Coculture of astrocytes with breast cancer cell supernatants altered glutamate (Glu)-centered arginine–proline metabolism. Similarly, the metabolome of cancer cells was also altered by astrocyte culture supernatants, and the changes were further amplified in astrocytes exposed to Glu. Inhibition of Glu uptake in astrocytes reduces the variability in cancer cells. Principal component analysis of the cancer cells revealed that all these changes were in the first principal component (PC1) axis, where the responsible metabolites were involved in the metabolism of the arginine–proline, pyrimidine, and pentose phosphate pathways. The contribution of these changes to the tumor microenvironment needs to be further pursued.


2021 ◽  
Vol 49 (1) ◽  
pp. 133-146
Author(s):  
T. A. Chikisheva ◽  
D. V. Pozdnyakov

On the basis of statistical analysis of craniometric data relating to Mesolithic and Neolithic samples from northern Eurasia, we discuss the peopling of the Baraba forest-steppe in the Early Holocene. This region is represented by samples from Sopka-2/1 (early sixth millennium BC), Protoka (late fifth to early fourth millennia BC), Korchugan (early-mid sixth millennium BC), and Vengerovo-2A (late sixth millennium BC). The results of the principal component analysis are interpreted in the context of debates over the role of autochthonous traditions in the Neolithic. During the Preboreal period (10 ka BP), large parts of the Baraba forest-steppe were flooded by the transgression of lake systems during climatic warming. This may have caused depopulation, lasting for at least a millennium. The Early Holocene people of Baraba were an offshoot of Meso-Neolithic populations of the northwestern Russian Plain. On that basis, the Early Neolithic populations of Baraba were formed. Direct population continuity is traceable only through the Chalcolithic. Since the late sixth millennium BC, however, the local population had incorporated migrants from the Pit-Comb Ware area in the central Russian Plain and, indirectly (via the Neolithic Altai), from the Cis-Baikal area.


2008 ◽  
Vol 21 (5) ◽  
pp. 1083-1103 ◽  
Author(s):  
Hamish A. Ramsay ◽  
Lance M. Leslie ◽  
Peter J. Lamb ◽  
Michael B. Richman ◽  
Mark Leplastrier

Abstract This study investigates the role of large-scale environmental factors, notably sea surface temperature (SST), low-level relative vorticity, and deep-tropospheric vertical wind shear, in the interannual variability of November–April tropical cyclone (TC) activity in the Australian region. Extensive correlation analyses were carried out between TC frequency and intensity and the aforementioned large-scale parameters, using TC data for 1970–2006 from the official Australian TC dataset. Large correlations were found between the seasonal number of TCs and SST in the Niño-3.4 and Niño-4 regions. These correlations were greatest (−0.73) during August–October, immediately preceding the Australian TC season. The correlations remain almost unchanged for the July–September period and therefore can be viewed as potential seasonal predictors of the forthcoming TC season. In contrast, only weak correlations (&lt;+0.37) were found with the local SST in the region north of Australia where many TCs originate; these were reduced almost to zero when the ENSO component of the SST was removed by partial correlation analysis. The annual frequency of TCs was found to be strongly correlated with 850-hPa relative vorticity and vertical shear of the zonal wind over the main genesis areas of the Australian region. Furthermore, correlations between the Niño SST and these two atmospheric parameters exhibited a strong link between the Australian region and the Niño-3.4 SST. A principal component analysis of the SST dataset revealed two main modes of Pacific Ocean SST variability that match very closely with the basinwide patterns of correlations between SST and TC frequencies. Finally, it is shown that the correlations can be increased markedly (e.g., from −0.73 to −0.80 for the August–October period) by a weighted combination of SST time series from weakly correlated regions.


2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steffen A. Schweizer ◽  
Carsten W. Mueller ◽  
Carmen Höschen ◽  
Pavel Ivanov ◽  
Ingrid Kögel-Knabner

AbstractCorrelations between organic carbon (OC) and fine mineral particles corroborate the important role of the abundance of soil minerals with reactive surfaces to bind and increase the persistence of organic matter (OM). The storage of OM broadly consists of particulate and mineral-associated forms. Correlative studies on the impact of fine mineral soil particles on OM storage mostly combined data from differing sites potentially confounded by other environmental factors. Here, we analyzed OM storage in a soil clay content gradient of 5–37% with similar farm management and mineral composition. Throughout the clay gradient, soils contained 14 mg OC g−1 on average in the bulk soil without showing any systematic increase. Density fractionation revealed that a greater proportion of OC was stored as occluded particulate OM in the high clay soils (18–37% clay). In low clay soils (5–18% clay), the fine mineral-associated fractions had up to two times higher OC contents than high clay soils. Specific surface area measurements revealed that more mineral-associated OM was related to higher OC loading. This suggests that there is a potentially thicker accrual of more OM at the same mineral surface area within fine fractions of the low clay soils. With increasing clay content, OM storage forms contained more particulate OC and mineral-associated OC with a lower surface loading. This implies that fine mineral-associated OC storage in the studied agricultural soils was driven by thicker accrual of OM and decoupled from clay content limitations.


Beskydy ◽  
2012 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 135-152
Author(s):  
A. Bajer ◽  
P. Samec ◽  
M. Žárník

The purpose of this paper is to determine the individual relations between APEA and specific soils and environmental factors. To disclose these relations, analysis of component vectors and principal component analysis (PCA) were performed. Vectors of soil characteristics with participation of APEA (aAKFE) and vectors of pedochemical variables (aCHEM) were also calculated. Their ratio (ia) indicated the relative size of the APEA impact on the relations between pedochemical characteristics. Based on the statistical analyses, different role of APEA in Norway spruce and in European beech stands was detected. While APEA in spruce stands did not show significant correlations with the other examined soil chemical properties, soils under beech stands displayed strong correlations with some of the pedochemical variables. The idea of this research is to find out whether APEA could be used as an indicator of forest vegetation status and of the anthropogenic load on a site.


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