ifoam'96 Book of Abstracts 11th IFOAM Scientific Conference 11-15 August 1996, Copenhagen, Denmark

ECOWEB FRONT PAGE SUBJECT INDEX AUTHOR INDEX

Posters

Soil Phosphatase Activity. P3; 66

Dept. of Ecology, Palacky University, CZ - 771 46 Olomouc, Czech Republic

Large proportions of the phosphorus in many soils is organically bound and their mineralization is of agricultural and economic importance. Soil phosphatase play a major role in the mineralization processes (dephosphorylation) of organic P substrate.
Research objectives, material and methods: The aim of this research was to determine both the acid and the alkaline phosphatase activities in agroecosystems, to gain more knowledge about the interaction of soil phosphatase with some soil characteristics together with the effects of farming systems on enzyme activity. Research was conducted both at experimental locations and on farms in the Czech Republic and in Sweden. The main goal of the study was to determine soil phosphatase using the modified method according to Tabatabai and Bremner (1969). During the analyses soil was incubated in a solution of p-nitrophenyl phosphate and the resultant p-nitrophenol was determined by means of spectrophotometry.
Results: The effects of the farming systems (conventional and alternative) were concluded at the experimental plots of the Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences. The results show that both the highest acid and alkaline phosphatase activity was to be found in alternative farming without animal husbandry with minimalized soil management followed by alternative farming with animal husbandry. The lowest means were recorded in conventional farming without animal husbandry and alternative farming without animal husbandry with standard soil management. The trials (in Sweden and also in the Czech Republic) have demonstrated that phosphatase activity is dependent on the amount of organic matter supply in the soil where the enzyme activities might be increased with the addition of energy sources. Increasing the carbon, total nitrogen and organic phosphorus content could serve as a basis for increasing both biological and enzymatic soil activities.

Sarapatka, B. (1996): Soil Phosphatase Activity in Agroecosystems. Faculty of Science, Palacky University Olomouc, 143 pp.

Tabatabai, M. A. and Bremner, J. M. (1969): Use of p-nitrophenylphosphate for assay of soil phosphatase activity. Soil Biol. Biochem., 1, 301-307.