Summary
A pot experiment was conducted to study the transformations of organic and inorganic N in soil and its availability to maize plants. Inorganic N was in the form of15N labelled ammonium sulphate (As) and15N labelledSesbania aculeata (Sa), a legume, was used as organic N source. Plants utilized 20% of the N applied as As; presence of Sa reduced the uptake to 14%. Only 5% of the Sa-N was taken up by the plants and As had no effect on the availability of N from Sa. Losses of N from As were found to be 40% which were reduced to 20% in presence of Sa. Losses of N were also observed from Sa which increased in the presence of As. Application of As had no effect on the availability of soil or Sa-N. However, more As-N was transported into microbial biomass and humus components in the presence of Sa.
Plants derived almost equal amounts of N from different sourcesi.e., soil, Sa and As. However, more As-N was transported into the shoots whereas the major portion of nitrogen in the roots was derived from Sa.
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Azam, F., Malik, K.A. & Sajjad, M.I. Transformations in soil and availability to plants of15N applied as inorganic fertilizer and legume residues. Plant Soil 86, 3–13 (1985). https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02185020
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BF02185020