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Dissimilatory nitrate reduction to ammonium (DNRA) plays an important role in soil nitrogen conservation in neutral and alkaline but not acidic rice soil

  • SOILS, SEC 1 • SOIL ORGANIC MATTER DYNAMICS AND NUTRIENT CYCLING • RESEARCH ARTICLE
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Abstract

Purpose

In the rice soils, the alternate wetting and drying conditions and the leakage of O2 from rice roots provides a favorable environment for many N transformation processes, such as DNRA, nitrification, mineralization, and denitrification. Since nitrification is an inevitable process providing available NO3 − for DNRA and other NO3 − loss pathways, it is logical to hypothesize that a relationship exists between nitrification and DNRA. Thus, we quantified the specific gross N transformation rates occurring simultaneously to investigate the correlation among the N transformation rates in the rice soil.

Material and methods

In this study, three rice soils with different pH values were selected. The combination of 15N tracing experiment and numerical modeling method was performed to quantify the specific gross N transformation rates (e.g., DNRA), to analyze the correlation between DNRA and the other N transformations, and to estimate the functional role of DNRA comparing to other N transformation in the rice soil.

Results and discussion

The results showed that there were two NH4 + production pathways, organic N mineralization and DNRA, in the neutral (pH 6.2) and alkaline (pH 8.2) soils, while the DNRA process was negligible in acidic soil (pH 4.7). The mineralization rate in the acidic soil (2.69 mg kg−1d−1) was significantly higher than that in neutral and alkaline soils. The DNRA rate was 0.48 and 1.09 mg kg−1d−1, which was almost equal to the mineralization rate, in the neutral (pH 6.2) and alkaline (pH 8.2) soils, offsetting efficiently the effect of low mineralization on N availability in ecosystems. The DNRA rate linearly increased with the increase in gross nitrification rate (p < 0.05). This significant coupling relationship between DNRA and nitrification favors N conservation and availability for paddy growth in the rice ecosystem.

Conclusions

DNRA plays an important role in soil N conservation and availability in neutral and alkaline but not acidic rice soil.

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Acknowledgments

This work was supported by grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (41330744 and 41222005), the Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province (BK20140062), the Natural Science Foundation of the Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions of China (13KJA210002), the Priority Academic Program Development of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions (PAPD), and the outstanding innovation team in Colleges and universities in Jiangsu Province.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of Geography Sciences, Nanjing Normal University, Nanjing, 210023, China

    Jinbo Zhang & Zucong Cai

  2. State Key Laboratory of Soil and Sustainable Agriculture, Institute of Soil Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China

    Jinbo Zhang & Ting Lan

  3. Jiangsu Provincial Key Laboratory of Materials Cycling and Pollution Control, Nanjing, 210023, China

    Jinbo Zhang & Zucong Cai

  4. Jiangsu Key Laboratory of Environmental Change and Ecological Construction, Nanjing, 210023, China

    Jinbo Zhang & Zucong Cai

  5. Key Laboratory of Virtual Geographical Environment (VGE), Ministry of Education, Nanjing Normal University, Nanjing, China

    Jinbo Zhang & Zucong Cai

  6. Department of Plant Ecology, Justus-Liebig University Giessen, Heinrich-Buff-Ring 26, 35392, Giessen, Germany

    Christoph Müller

Authors
  1. Jinbo Zhang
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  2. Ting Lan
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  3. Christoph Müller
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  4. Zucong Cai
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Correspondence to Jinbo Zhang or Zucong Cai.

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Responsible editor: Zhihong Xu

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Zhang, J., Lan, T., Müller, C. et al. Dissimilatory nitrate reduction to ammonium (DNRA) plays an important role in soil nitrogen conservation in neutral and alkaline but not acidic rice soil. J Soils Sediments 15, 523–531 (2015). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-014-1037-7

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-014-1037-7

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