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The Use of 15N Enriched Fertilizers for Estimating Nitrogen Fixation in Grain and Pasture Legumes

  • Chapter
Nitrogen Fixation by Legumes in Mediterranean Agriculture

Part of the book series: Developments in Plant and Soil Sciences ((DPSS,volume 32))

Summary

The optimization of the potential of many legumes to fix atmospheric nitrogen (N2) in different environments requires suitable methodologies to distinguish between the contribution from this process and from soil and fertilizer nitrogen uptake. Most of the available methods suffer from serious drawbacks, and therefore cannot give accurate quantitative estimates of the amount of N2 fixed.

The 15N isotope labelling techniques involving the application of 15N-en-riched fertilizers to soil provide reliable integrated estimates of the proportions and amounts of N2 fixed by several grain and pasture legumes. Such studies can be performed directly in the field. Two approaches, the isotope-dilution and A-value methodologies, have been used and some of the underlying concepts in these techniques are discussed in this paper. Currently, the isotope-dilution approach seems to be more popular than the A-value approach.

The precision and accuracy of N2-fixation estimates made with these techniques are strongly influenced by the reference crop used to assess the 15N/14N ratio or the available nitrogen in the soil (A-soil). The use of an appropriate reference crop is therefore crucial. The criteria for the selection of the reference crop are discussed, as well as practices that reduce errors in the estimates of N2 fixed. While these errors may be serious at low levels of fixation, their influence at high fixation levels is small.

A major disadvantage of 15N techniques is their high cost. Practices such as the use of residual 15N or 15N-labelled plant residues from previous experiments result in reduced costs, and the estimates of N2-fixation obtained have been shown to have high precision.

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  1. Division Vienna, Joint FAO/IAEA, Austria

    S. K. A. Danso

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  1. The International Center for Agricultural Research in the Dry Areas, (ICARDA), Aleppo, Syria

    D. P. Beck  & L. A. Materon  & 

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Danso, S.K.A. (1988). The Use of 15N Enriched Fertilizers for Estimating Nitrogen Fixation in Grain and Pasture Legumes. In: Beck, D.P., Materon, L.A. (eds) Nitrogen Fixation by Legumes in Mediterranean Agriculture. Developments in Plant and Soil Sciences, vol 32. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-1387-5_34

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-009-1387-5_34

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