Nitrogen Fixing Bacteria That Can Colonize Most Plants Discovered

Zothecula writes "Synthetic crop fertilizers are a huge source of pollution. This is particularly true when they're washed from fields (or leach out of them) and enter our waterways. Unfortunately, most commercial crops need the fertilizer, because it provides the nitrogen that they require to survive. Now, however, a scientist at the University of Nottingham has developed what he claims is an environmentally-friendly process, that allows virtually any type of plant to obtain naturally-occurring nitrogen directly from the atmosphere." The process involves injecting a bacteria that colonizes the plant and fixes atmospheric nitrogen in exchange for a bit of sugar, similar to soybeans. Only this bacteria will readily colonize most any plant.

I read it as they can "colonize most planets"

[Anonymous Coward]

Massive let down when I realized it wasn't a breakthrough in terraforming! :((((

Great, now what about phosphorous?

[PeterM from Berkeley]

Plants need phosphorous almost as much as they need nitrogen. Currently, we're using mined sources of phosphorous as fertilizer--and there is a finite supply of really good phosphorous sources.

Potassium (the third major plant nutrient) we can extract from seawater without any problems, but the seawater concentration of phosphorous is much lower.

So what do we do about phosphorous?

--PeterM

Could be a revolution, could be a fizzle

[Guppy]

If the claims are true (60% of a plant's nitrogen requirements, adaptable to most crops), this is absolutely huge. All the research on how legumes manage their symbiotic organisms seemed to point to a long, hard slog in adapting nitrogen fixation to other crops, and now here it is from a naturally occurring organism.

But before I break out the champagne, I'm going to ask whereisthefuckingpaper?

Re:What could possibly go wrong?

[ThatsLoseNotLoose]

I'm sure you're joking.

But just in case you're not, read the terrifying account of Klebsiella planticola [mst.edu].

Had they just released it to see what would happen, we might all be starving to death right now.

Re:Quick!

[gmanterry]

What if this thing gets out of hand and plants start to become larger as they are fed more nitrogen. We could become overrun with weed type plants that we can't control. Almost everything has unintended consequences. From the laws made in Congress to the modification of plants.

This is potentially huge

[Billy the Mountain]

Ammonia is the second only to petrochemical production and 83% goes to fertilizer. If the bacteria can replace most requirements for nitrogen fertilizer this will drastically reduce reliance on energy for agriculture, especially the reducing natural gas that is converted to hydrogen to make Ammonia

Re:Great, now what about phosphorous?

[ShanghaiBill]

I remember reading "Life's Bottleneck" by Issac Asimov. He calculates that if life expands and uses the elements in the entire crust of the earth, the phosphorus will be exhausted first, before carbon, nitrogen, or even trace elements like iodine and selenium. Phosphorus is life's bottleneck.

But there is a big difference between fertilizing with phosphorus and nitrogen. You only need to add phosphorus once, and then only enough annually to replace what is taken out with the crop, which is usually not much. It is a permanent addition to the soil. But the nitrogen is consumed and returned to the atmosphere as the plants grow and then decay. You need to replenish it every year, either with fertilizer or legumes.