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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.
Monsanto or DuPont.
The mind conceives, the body achieves, the spirit manifests.
Animals are now obsolete. The plants can kill us off now, watch our for your cucumbers and geraniums.
With a bacteria that can infect plants and cause them to suck nitrogen out of the air... let out of control on a large scale, this may affect the world in a drastic way, much like how the first oxygen producing microbes first appeared on earth.
Massive let down when I realized it wasn't a breakthrough in terraforming! :((((
Seriously? What's wrong with using nitrogen fixing plants to fill the soil with nitrogen? Yeah .. it's much more fun to engineer your own plant effects but it can have unknown side effects. If you're going to try to get rid of artificial fertilizers, shouldn't you be ensuring that your solution is sustainable? Creating and distributing large quantities of bacteria with unknown long term effects is not a known quantity and hence .. is not a sustainable solution.
May as well keep spraying artificial fertilizers, at least we know how that degrades the soil.
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
If no plant needs nitrogen fertilizer, does this mean that we can stop producing ammonium nitrate and other nitrates in huge quantities, many of which can be used to make explosives?
Does this mean we could realistically reduce the availability of now-common bomb-making materials?
--PeterM
http://youtu.be/9q6QkUaXx_A
"To err is human, to mod Funny divine."
Now all we need is a bazillion immigrant labourers to run around the fields with syringes injecting plants.
Let me know if they ever figure out how to apply this bacteria to seed before planting or spraying after sprouting. Then they'll have something worth talking about.
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
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?
Insects.
Specifically, you release sap sucking insects that like to stuff their sharp little noses deep into the tissues of green plants already, such as aphids.
Cross the nitrogen fixating bacteria with wolbachia parasite, so that it can live in both hosts, and watch the plants take over.
The process that Cocking developed, based on his discovery, is known as N-Fix. It involves covering seeds in a non-toxic coating that contains the bacterium.
Let me know if they ever figure out how to apply this bacteria to seed before planting or spraying after sprouting. Then they'll have something worth talking about.
Er, that's exactly what is disussed in TFA:
"The process that Cocking developed, based on his discovery, is known as N-Fix. It involves covering seeds in a non-toxic coating that contains the bacterium. As a seed sprouts and the plant grows, the bacterium enters through its roots, and ultimately ends up in every cell of the plant. This means that every one of those cells is capable of fixing nitrogen from the atmosphere – just like sugarcane does."
For those too lazy:
Wolbachia is a genus of parasitical/symbiotic micro-organisms that infect arthropods, including most insects
Many species of insect that have intimate contact with plants and plant juices harbor this parasite. including aphids
Now, asking if that is "a good idea" or not? That's an entirely different question!
If the ground gets all full of nitrogen, won't we just sink into it?
That's where we use to get it and the supply is possibly limitless.
We just found it more efficient/cheaper to mine the rock concentrations. If they run out, we go back to the guano.
No, that's a silly reason to ban anything, because most anything can be used to make an explosive quite easily and trivially. Look around, your cotton or hemp or silk or synthentic clothing; plastics; wood products; metals like iron, aluminum, copper, zinc, lead, graphite; the various basic chemicals like soap, window wash, drain opener; the acidic things like car battery acid, vinegar, muriatic acid; the "chlorine" powder for your swimming pool; hydrocarbons from paraffin to coal to liquid fuels and hydraulic oils to natural gas; catalysts like the platinum in your car's catalytic converter .......all can be used to make powerful explosives.
it's nonsense, to say we can ban ingredients for explosives. It's even more silly than saying we can ban the ingredients for making booze.
You wouldn't want to stab every single wheat stalk in a field, but for anything like, say, orchards, with lasting plants, one injection could provide a hundred years worth of productivity.
1.Patent it
2.Spread it
3.Sue everybody on the planet and beyond
4.???
5.Profit!
Somehow make my food prices go up and up. Pressure canning is back for a reason. And I think it is theft.
There are only four known objects with nitrogen atmospheres: Earth (already terraformed by microbes), Titan (surface temperature -220 C), Triton and Pluto (surface pressure ~10 microbars). The only two terraforming targets are Mars and (at a stretch) Venus, both of which have almost zero nitrogen in their atmospheres.
This is either a critical research failure, or hyping up a somewhat boring discovery to a more exciting one, or both.
A common biological thread between every food supply on the planet.
What's the worst that can happen?
Yes, but can you buy all of that stuff in really large quantities without making people suspicious? And I doubt any of them are really as simple+effective+safe as your nitrogen-based explosives.
--PM
It's (very) probably the journalist's fault, but the summary and the article have taken the sentence below completely out of context.
Unfortunately, most commercial crops need the fertilizer, because it provides the nitrogen that they require to survive
Now, it's quite true that plants (in general) require nitrogen to survive, grow well and reproduce. But, the crops don't need fertiliser to provide nitrogen. If that were true then plants would not have existed before fertiliser was "invented". No, the main reason that fertiliser is required is that the soils have been depleted of nitrogen through bad land management practices -- over-cropping, erosion, not rotating crops, exposure of the soil to high temperature/light, the death of soil fungi, microflora, bacteria, etc, etc, etc. I.e. The methods of (most methods and implementation of) modern agrigulture on a large scale destroys natural processes or organisms that help take nitrogen from the atmosphere into the soil and/or processes that make nitrogen in the soil available for uptake and use by the crop/plants.
With different land management methods it is entirely possible for commercial crops to not need (artificial) fertiliser.
To me this seems like a band-aid that could -- potentially -- encourage even worse farming/agricultural methods. It might encourage the destruction of more rainforest (in rainforests most of the nutrients are held within the plants, trees, shrubs, lianas, etc themselves rather than in the soil, so land that was previously inhabited by rainforest generally has poor soil nutrient levels); if a quick-fix coat-your-seed-with-magic solution exists that will allow crops to flourish in otherwise unsuitable soils then won't someone get the notion that "hey we couldn't grow shit here in the past, but now we can! Money! Stuff the rainforests, let's get rid of it and plant tobacco. The conditions that stopped us in the past (i.e. poor yield) no longer apply. We're rich!" and... ?
All nitrogen in soil (well, just about all) and then into plants comes from the atmosphere anyway!
The bacteria gets its energy from sugar in the plant. How much sugar? How much does it decrease the plant's yield.
Just what we need zombie plants controlled by symbiotic bacteria like in I Am Legend.
We are going to use this bacteria on all or most of our crops. So this bacteria will be wide spread in the enviorment. The bacteria can grow in most plants so it is likely to spread to other plants. Natural plant communities have evolved with some plants using nitrogen and other plants producing nitrogen usable by themselves and the non nitrogen producing plants. Plants that were limited by lack of nitrogen would no longer be limited. A very high degree of disruption of natural communities seems likely. This doesn't seem to occur in sugar cane producing areas so maybe it's OK. But please test this carefully before it is introduced widely.
...that we have an interest in the plant?
what makes you think anything needs to be bought? you missed the point totally. reagents can't be banned because they're everywhere in abundant supply. for example, you mentioned the nitrogen-based explosives. The road to those can start with a barrel of piss
Well we can start by getting rid of cemetaries and graveyards, and stop cremating people.
Um... apropos of nothing, how does cremation affect the phosphorus content?
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
That was the turning point of my life--I went from negative zero to positive zero.
Okay, I'll be the first to ask:
How is the dispersion of these bacteria controlled? Will the bacteria spread to other plants, such as weeds? Will they be spread by air-borne reproductive means? (Not that food crops use dandelions tufts, but you know what I mean - pollen or seeds blown around by the wind.)
Will these be the 3-d equivalent of Bolivian Tree Lizards?
I'm all for scientific progress and not a big fan of Jeremy Rifkin, but he serves an important purpose by voicing concerns and making people stop to consider some of the larger ramifications.
Let's not stop the research, but I really think we should do some environmental impact studies.
Currently about three billion pounds of KNO3 are made each year. Suppose the researcher's hopes come true and that is cut in half. That would mean only 1,500,000,000 pounds would be on the market each year. Of course, it's not just used for fertilizer, there are many other uses. But if you did replace all those other uses, there would only be enough KNO3 to make ten million bombs per year. Of course, horse stables are full of it, too - stale urine is potassium nitrate.
You know why you can't take liquids on airplanes? Hydrogen peroxide and nail polish remover. If you mix the two correctly, you get a VERY powerful explosive . (If you mix them incorrectly you get dead. Don't try it. It's a great explosive for SUICIDE bombers.)
Another frequently used and powerful explosive is aluminium powder. Yep, ground up tinfoil. Don't try that at home either, it might blow up while you're grinding it. Adding Parlon can help. Parlon is also known as Saran Wrap.
Grind up ping pong balls, that modern gunpowder, called smokeless powder.
So you see, to make any progress by banning stuff you would need to ban half the stuff in the grocery store. Oh, and don't forget to ban livestock, so everyone would have to be vegetarian. ( remember, where animals piss, potassium nitrate crystallizes.)
So when do we start terraforming?
if they were to use this on a massive scale could that significantly change the composition of the air we breath, causing potential health problems / demise of life on earth? im not a biochemist but I do know we evolved with certain amount of N present in the atmosphere...i hope they know what theyre doing
Now I'm all disappointed and stuff.
The plants can kill us off now, watch our for your cucumbers and geraniums.
It's the triffids you really need to be careful of.
According to the article, the bacteria will live within the plant's cells. This is certainly possible (such endosymbiosis was the origin of mitochondria and chloroplasts) but I do wonder whether it is really the case here, or if the reporter made an error.
If it does work as well as claimed (I'm always a bit skeptical about these 'amazing new tech' claims) then expect a whole lot of effort to go into breeding new plant varieties that get the most out of their new symbiont.
Quattuor res in hoc mundo sanctae sunt: libri, liberi, libertas et liberalitas.
Where have you been? Late again, as usual.
I didn't even *skim* the article. :P
I do not fail; I succeed at finding out what does not work.
It is BACTERIA that fixes nitrogen.
NOT NITROGEN that fixes bacteria.
Are there any editors around?
the subject says it all ...
tho it omits references to bio catastrophes from this 'all plant' vulnerability...
we should be afraid .. very afraid ....
Make use of the phosphorous that is already present in deeper soils. Plant dynamic accumulators that cycle nutrients such as phosphorous from their roots to their surface as companion plants to your crops.
Check out the dynamic accumulator list in the following:
http://www.nsfarming.com/Media/KOURICK_Soil_Indicators_86.pdf
Another option: include bird-attracting plants or feeders. Their manure is rich in many nutrients, including phosphorous.
I've read the article and have researched this before for my own farm. There are products already on the market that seem to do what the article talks about so I'm not really sure that this is anything new. However, if they are using Azotobacter bacteria, I'm curios how they are making it symbiotic as it generally isn't.
We don't need to develop this in a lab. It is already being done in many plants and used as a strategy for sustainable soil development.
Here's how:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TMQ8eSm92xQ
This sounds something like the alder tree does: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alder#Nitrogen_fixation Probably other plants that does this also.
Read the article. They coat the seeds.
This is great news! Until the bacteria evolve to colonize humans!
I, for one, welcome our new nitrogen fixing overlords.
http://spongebob.wikia.com/wiki/The_Krabby_Patty_That_Ate_Bikini_Bottom
Hmm.. did not the article say that they needed to treat the seeds before planting them??
It saddens me that this is the only post where "bacterium" is used properly in the singular context, rather than the plural "bacteria".