Abstract
Earthworms, by their soil-dwelling nature, feeding and burrowing activity in the soil, are known to increase soil fertility and are also referred as nature's plough by Charles Darwin. They ingest organic matter from the soil, are exposed to microbes and pollutants, and excrete casts in the soil adding to the soil fertility. Although earthworms are essential for soil mineralisation process, their metabolism and impact on environment are not well studied. In this study, we investigated the gut voided biochemical constituents of Lampito mauritii (L. mauritii) and analyzed by FT-IR and GC–MS studies. The results indicated significant findings, including identification of unique biochemical components with 16 major compounds in L. mauritii with a significant peak at retention time 4.09 and other peaks at 4.13, 4.27, 4.53, 4.88, 5.44, 7.21 and 16.49 revealed by GC–MS analysis Our study highlights the expression of unique compounds in the earthworm. It emphasises that metabolism may play a predominant role in altering ingested components of soil organic matter, and the earthworm casts may have a positive impact on the environment.
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Acknowledgements
The author acknowledges, Director, NISER, Bhubaneswar, Odisha, India for the study. FT-IR based studies were done in Central facility of OUAT, Odisha, India under paid facility. The authors are grateful to Dr. Chandrakanta Mandal, Scientist Zoological Survey of India (ZSI) and Director ZSI for the taxonomic identification of the earthworm specimen.
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SG and AD performed the experiments, analysed the data and results, wrote, revised the ms and SG communicated the paper.
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No vertebrate or human tissues were used. Earthworms are invertebrates, collected from local soil and recorded under Zoological Survey of India, Kolkata.
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