Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: M. Matucha Author-Workplace-Name: Institute of Experimental Botany, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Name: N. Clarke Author-Workplace-Name: Norwegian Forest and Landscape Institute, Aas, Norway Author-Name: Z. Lachmanová Author-Workplace-Name: Forestry and Game Management Research Institute, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Name: S.T. Forczek Author-Workplace-Name: Institute of Experimental Botany, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Name: K. Fuksová Author-Workplace-Name: First Faculty of Medicine, Charles University, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Name: M. Gryndler Author-Workplace-Name: Institute of Microbiology, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Prague, Czech Republic Title: Biogeochemical cycles of chlorine in the coniferous forest ecosystem: practical implications Abstract: Chlorine - one of the most widespread elements on the Earth - is present in the environment as chloride ion or bound to organic substances. The main source of chloride ions is the oceans while organically bound chlorine (OCl) comes from various sources, including anthropogenic ones. Chlorinated organic compounds were long considered to be only industrial products; nevertheless, organochlorines occur plentifully in natural ecosystems. However, recent investigations in temperate and boreal forest ecosystems have shown them to be products of biodegradation of soil organic matter under participation of chlorine. It is important to understand both the inorganic and organic biogeochemical cycling of chlorine in order to understand processes in the forest ecosystem and dangers as a result of human activities, i.e. emission and deposition of anthropogenic chlorinated compounds as well as those from natural processes. The minireview presented below provides a survey of contemporary knowledge of the state of the art and a basis for investigations of formation and degradation of organochlorines and monitoring of chloride and organochlorines in forest ecosystems, which has not been carried out in the Czech Republic yet. Keywords: chlorine cycle, chlorination, enzymatic, abiotic, organochlorines, adsorbable organic halogenes Journal: Plant, Soil and Environment Pages: 357-367 Volume: 56 Issue: 8 Year: 2010 DOI: 10.17221/67/2010-PSE File-URL: http://pse.agriculturejournals.cz/doi/10.17221/67/2010-PSE.html File-Format: text/html X-File-Ref: http://agriculturejournals.cz/RePEc/caa/references/pse-201008-0001.txt Handle: RePEc:caa:jnlpse:v:56:y:2010:i:8:id:67-2010-PSE Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: K. Hamouz Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Plant Production, Faculty of Agrobiology, Food and Natural Resources, Czech University of Life Sciences in Prague, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Name: J. Lachman Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Agrobiology, Food and Natural Resources, Czech University of Life Sciences in Prague, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Name: K. Hejtmánková Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Chemistry, Faculty of Agrobiology, Food and Natural Resources, Czech University of Life Sciences in Prague, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Name: K. Pazderů Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Plant Production, Faculty of Agrobiology, Food and Natural Resources, Czech University of Life Sciences in Prague, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Name: M. Čížek Author-Workplace-Name: Potato Research Institute, Havlíčkův Brod, Czech Republic Author-Name: P. Dvořák Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Plant Production, Faculty of Agrobiology, Food and Natural Resources, Czech University of Life Sciences in Prague, Prague, Czech Republic Title: Effect of natural and growing conditions on the contentof phenolics in potatoes with different flesh colour Abstract: In precise field trials in the Czech Republic from 2004-2008 the impact of location conditions, varieties with yellow, purple and red flesh and mineral fertilization on the content of total polyphenols (TP) and chlorogenic acid was investigated. The highest TP contents were reported at two locations with extreme climatic conditions; in those under stress due to low temperatures in the vegetation period at the mountainous area Stachy (5.89 mg TP/g DM) and those under drought stress in the warm lowland location Přerov nad Labem with light sandy soil (5.81 mg TP/g DM). The five-year experiment with the purple-fleshed Valfi variety (13.29 mg TP/g DM) reached 2.46 to 3.18 times higher content of TP in comparison with eight yellow-fleshed varieties. The yellow-fleshed Karin variety (5.39 mg TP/g DM) outperformed TP content of other yellow-fleshed varieties by 3.1 to 29.1%. In another experiment conclusive differences between the eight varieties with purple and red flesh were found; the highest TP content was detected in cv. Violette (25.9 mg TP/g DM) with the darkest purple flesh. As to the chlorogenic acid content similar relationships between varieties were found as in the case of TP. High linear correlation (r = 0.8536) was found between the content of chlorogenic acid and the content of TP. Among the treatments of mineral N, P, K and Mg fertilization, the content of TP was only affected by a treatment with a higher dose of K and Mg, causing a decrease in TP content. Keywords: potato, polyphenols, chlorogenic acid, flesh colour, location, fertilization Journal: Plant, Soil and Environment Pages: 368-374 Volume: 56 Issue: 8 Year: 2010 DOI: 10.17221/49/2010-PSE File-URL: http://pse.agriculturejournals.cz/doi/10.17221/49/2010-PSE.html File-Format: text/html X-File-Ref: http://agriculturejournals.cz/RePEc/caa/references/pse-201008-0002.txt Handle: RePEc:caa:jnlpse:v:56:y:2010:i:8:id:49-2010-PSE Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: Mahaveer P. Sharma Author-Workplace-Name: Microbiology Section, Directorate of Soybean Research (ICAR), Indore, India Author-Name: Khushboo Srivastava Author-Workplace-Name: Microbiology Section, Directorate of Soybean Research (ICAR), Indore, India Author-Name: Sushil K. Sharma Author-Workplace-Name: Microbiology Section, Directorate of Soybean Research (ICAR), Indore, India Title: Biochemical characterization and metabolic diversity of soybean rhizobia isolated from Malwa region of Central India Abstract: Soybean cultivation in many zones of India shows occurrence of native rhizobia besides other exotically adapted strains. In the current study, 22 rhizobial isolates (recovered from 12 different soybean growing sites) and 8 reference strains were selected for biochemical and metabolic characterization. Of 22 isolates, 18 were recovered as fast growing isolates while the rest were slow growing based on bromothymol blue (BTB) test. Unlike earlier belief that rhizobia have no ability to grow on glucose peptone agar medium, in this study, some isolates and some reference strains grew well on this medium. Similarly, when all the isolates were subjected to ketolactose test, some of the isolates were found to show growth on the medium. In contrast, based on C-utilization pattern (15 carbohydrates) a remarkable metabolic diversity was observed among the rhizobial isolates recovered in the study. The clustering and matching analysis showed that most of isolates were matching with slow growing reference strains, a few were with fast growing reference strains and some were found to be unique and hence not matching with any of reference strains. Such analysis suggests the occurrence of metabolically distinct types of rhizobia besides commonly known types (B. japonicum, B. elkanii and S. fredii) of soybean rhizobia and further validation is suggested through 16SrRNA gene sequencing technique. Keywords: soybean rhizobia, metabolic diversity, biochemical characterization Journal: Plant, Soil and Environment Pages: 375-383 Volume: 56 Issue: 8 Year: 2010 DOI: 10.17221/247/2009-PSE File-URL: http://pse.agriculturejournals.cz/doi/10.17221/247/2009-PSE.html File-Format: text/html X-File-Ref: http://agriculturejournals.cz/RePEc/caa/references/pse-201008-0003.txt Handle: RePEc:caa:jnlpse:v:56:y:2010:i:8:id:247-2009-PSE Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: B. Liu Author-Workplace-Name: Key Laboratory of Mollisol Agroecology, Northeast Institute of Geography and Agroecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Harbin, P.R. China Author-Workplace-Name: Graduate University of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, P.R. China Author-Workplace-Name: College of Life Science, Jilin Normal University, Siping, P.R. China Author-Name: X.B. Liu Author-Workplace-Name: Key Laboratory of Mollisol Agroecology, Northeast Institute of Geography and Agroecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Harbin, P.R. China Author-Name: C. Wang Author-Workplace-Name: Key Laboratory of Mollisol Agroecology, Northeast Institute of Geography and Agroecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Harbin, P.R. China Author-Name: Y.S. Li Author-Workplace-Name: Key Laboratory of Mollisol Agroecology, Northeast Institute of Geography and Agroecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Harbin, P.R. China Author-Name: J. Jin Author-Workplace-Name: Key Laboratory of Mollisol Agroecology, Northeast Institute of Geography and Agroecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Harbin, P.R. China Author-Name: S.J. Herbert Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Plant, Soil, and Insect Sciences, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, USA Title: Soybean yield and yield component distribution across the main axis in response to light enrichment and shading under different densities Abstract: A 2-year field experiment was conducted under light enrichment and shading conditions to examine the responses of seed yield and yield components distribution across main axis in soybean. The results showed that the maximum increase in seed yield per plant by light enrichment occurred at 27 plants/m2, while the most significant reduction in seed yield per plant by shading occurred at 54 plants/m2. Light enrichment beginning at early flowering stage decreased seed size on average by 7% while shading increased seed size on average by 9% over densities and cultivars, resulting in a fewer extent compensation in seed yield decrement. Responses to light enrichment and shading occurred proportionately across the main axis node positions despite the differences in the time (15-20 days) of development of yield components between the high and low node positions. Variation intensity of seed size of three soybeans was dissimilar as a result of changes in the environment during the reproductive period. The small-seed cultivar had the greatest stability in single seed size across the main axis, followed by moderate-seed cultivar, while large-seed cultivar was the least stable. Although maximum seed size may be determined by genetic potential in soybean plants, our results suggested that seed size can still be modified by environmental conditions, and the impact can be expressed through some internal control moderating the final size of most seeds in main stem and in all pods. It indicates that, through redistributing the available resources across main stem to components, soybean plants showed the mechanism, in an attempt to maintain or improve yield in a constantly changing environment. Keywords: light enrichment, shading, yield component, seed size Journal: Plant, Soil and Environment Pages: 384-392 Volume: 56 Issue: 8 Year: 2010 DOI: 10.17221/189/2009-PSE File-URL: http://pse.agriculturejournals.cz/doi/10.17221/189/2009-PSE.html File-Format: text/html X-File-Ref: http://agriculturejournals.cz/RePEc/caa/references/pse-201008-0004.txt Handle: RePEc:caa:jnlpse:v:56:y:2010:i:8:id:189-2009-PSE Template-Type: ReDIF-Article 1.0 Author-Name: L. Strnad Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Ecology, Faculty of Environmental Sciences, Czech University of Life Sciences, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Name: M. Hejcman Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Ecology, Faculty of Environmental Sciences, Czech University of Life Sciences, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Workplace-Name: Crop Research Institute, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Name: V. Křišťálová Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Ecology, Faculty of Environmental Sciences, Czech University of Life Sciences, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Name: P. Hejcmanová Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Forest Management, Faculty of Forestry, Wildlife and Wood Sciences, Czech University of Life Sciences, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Name: V. Pavlů Author-Workplace-Name: Department of Ecology, Faculty of Environmental Sciences, Czech University of Life Sciences, Prague, Czech Republic Author-Workplace-Name: Crop Research Institute, Prague, Czech Republic Title: Mechanical weeding of Rumex obtusifolius L. under different N, P and K availabilities in permanent grassland Abstract: In Europe, Rumex obtusifolius L. is the most problematic grassland weed species, especially under the conditions of organic farming. The aims of this study were (1) to investigate the effectiveness of repeated mechanical weeding of R. obtusifolius from the permanent sward, cut two or three times per year, by digging the plants out from 5 cm below the soil surface, and (2) to test the effect of nutrient availability on the effectiveness of mechanical weeding. In 2007, the manipulative experiment was established on permanent grassland infested by R. obtusifolius using the following fertilizer treatments: control, P, N, NP and NPK. Plants of R. obtusifolius were removed eight times during three vegetation seasons. No significant decrease in the density of R. obtusifolius was recorded after three vegetation seasons and density was not significantly affected by fertilizer treatment. The cover of R. obtusifolius decreased slightly, but significantly, over the study period from 7.5% to 4.5%. The cover of R. obtusifolius was only marginally affected by fertilizer treatment. Mechanical weeding by digging the plants out from 5 cm below the ground is not a sufficient method of control for R. obtusifolius in infested fertile grasslands, even when applied eight times during three vegetation seasons. Keywords: broad-leaved dock, fertilizer experiment, nitrogen, phosphorus, potassium, plant cover and density, weed control Journal: Plant, Soil and Environment Pages: 393-399 Volume: 56 Issue: 8 Year: 2010 DOI: 10.17221/83/2010-PSE File-URL: http://pse.agriculturejournals.cz/doi/10.17221/83/2010-PSE.html File-Format: text/html X-File-Ref: http://agriculturejournals.cz/RePEc/caa/references/pse-201008-0005.txt Handle: RePEc:caa:jnlpse:v:56:y:2010:i:8:id:83-2010-PSE