Books in Crop nutrients and nutrition

Nitrogen in the Environment: Sources, Problems and Management

1st Edition
December 3, 2001
R.F. Follett + 1 more
English
eBook
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Nitrogen in the Environment: Sources, Problems, and Management is the first volume to provide a holistic perspective and comprehensive treatment of nitrogen from field, to ecosystem, to treatment of urban and rural drinking water supplies, while also including a historical overview, human health impacts and policy considerations. It provides a worldwide perspective on nitrogen and agriculture.Nitrogen is one of the most critical elements required in agricultural systems for the production of crops for feed, food and fiber. The ever-increasing world population requires increasing use of nitrogen in agriculture to supply human needs for dietary protein. Worldwide demand for nitrogen will increase as a direct response to increasing population. Strategies and perspectives are considered to improve nitrogen-use efficiency. Issues of nitrogen in crop and human nutrition, and transport and transformations along the continuum from farm field to ground water, watersheds, streams, rivers, and coastal marine environments are discussed. Described are aerial transport of nitrogen from livestock and agricultural systems and the potential for deposition and impacts. The current status of nitrogen in the environment in selected terrestrial and coastal environments and crop and forest ecosystems and development of emerging technologies to minimize nitrogen impacts on the environment are addressed. The nitrogen cycle provides a framework for assessing broad scale or even global strategies to improve nitrogen use efficiency. Growing human populations are the driving force that requires increased nitrogen inputs. These increasing inputs into the food-production system directly result in increased livestock and human-excretory nitrogen contribution into the environment.The scope of this book is diverse, covering a range of topics and issues from furthering our understanding of nitrogen in the environment to policy considerations at both farm and national scales.

Silicon in Agriculture

1st Edition
Volume 8
April 11, 2001
L.E. Datnoff + 2 more
English
Hardback
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eBook
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Presenting the first book to focus on the importance of silicon for plant health and soil productivity and on our current understanding of this element as it relates to agriculture.Long considered by plant physiologists as a non-essential element, or plant nutrient, silicon was the center of attention at the first international conference on Silicon in Agriculture, held in Florida in 1999.Ninety scientists, growers, and producers of silicon fertilizer from 19 countries pondered a paradox in plant biology and crop science. They considered the element Si, second only to oxygen in quantity in soils, and absorbed by many plants in amounts roughly equivalent to those of such nutrients as sulfur or magnesium. Some species, including such staples as rice, may contain this element in amounts as great as or even greater than any other inorganic constituent. Compilations of the mineral composition of plants, however, and much of the plant physiological literature largely ignore this element. The participants in Silicon in Agriculture explored that extraordinary discrepancy between the silicon content of plants and that of the plant research enterprise.The participants, all of whom are active in agricultural science, with an emphasis on crop production, presented, and were presented with, a wealth of evidence that silicon plays a multitude of functions in the real world of plant life. Many soils in the humid tropics are low in plant available silicon, and the same condition holds in warm to hot humid areas elsewhere. Field experience, and experimentation even with nutrient solutions, reveals a multitude of functions of silicon in plant life. Resistance to disease is one, toleration of toxic metals such as aluminum, another. Silicon applications often minimize lodging of cereals (leaning over or even becoming prostrate), and often cause leaves to assume orientations more favorable for light interception. For some crops, rice and sugarcane in particular, spectacular yield responses to silicon application have been obtained. More recently, other crop species including orchids, daisies and yucca were reported to respond to silicon accumulation and plant growth/disease control. The culture solutions used for the hydroponic production of high-priced crops such as cucumbers and roses in many areas (The Netherlands for example) routinely included silicon, mainly for disease control. The biochemistry of silicon in plant cell walls, where most of it is located, is coming increasingly under scrutiny; the element may act as a crosslinking element between carbohydrate polymers.There is an increased conviction among scientists that the time is at hand to stop treating silicon as a plant biological nonentity. The element exists, and it matters.

Advances in Agronomy

1st Edition
Volume 71
October 2, 2000
Donald L. Sparks
English
eBook
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Volume 71 contains six outstanding reviews that discuss cutting edge developments in the crop and soil sciences. Chapter 1 addresses advances in the development, use, and evaluation of controlled release fertilizers. Chapter 2 is a comprehensive review of developments in breeding crops for increased nutritional value. Historical and current advances in the field are covered as well as selection in methodology and employment of molecular biology tools. Chapter 3 is a comprehensive treatment of remaking bean plant architecture for efficient production. Chapter 4 is a review on carbon sequestration, specifically, the potential of world cropland solid to serve as a source of atmospheric carbon. Chapter 5 discusses the ability of grain legumes (pulses) to adapt to water-limited environments. Chapter 6 describes and applies an important water quality model - the root zone water quality model (RZWQM). The model is described and discussion is provided on the calibration and application in laboratory and field settings.

Nitrogen Management and Ground Water Protection

1st Edition
Volume 21
December 2, 2012
Ronald F Follett
English
eBook
9 7 8 0 4 4 4 5 9 9 3 9 1

Supplying crops with adequate nitrogen is vital to ensuring food supplies. Once nitrogen is added to the soil, it is subject to chemical transformations of the nitrogen-cycle including transformation to nitrate. Excessive amounts of accumulated nitrate may then leach out of the soil and could potentially enter and contaminate drinking water supplies. The purpose of this book is to examine the subject of nitrogen management and ground water protection.The issue of maintaining ground water quality is addressed primarily from an agronomic point of view. Topics covered include: health and economic aspects of nitrate in drinking water; nitrate sources; ground water nitrate in the USA and other developed countries; transport, leaching and accounting for nitrogen; soil, nitrogen, crop and water management; and nitrate in aquifer systems. The book contains a keyword index and is organized into thirteen chapters, each with appropriate references, tables and figures. Chapter authors are among the leading experts on the subject of nitrate and ground water quality.Readers to whom the book is directed include soil scientists and agronomists, agricultural engineers (irrigation and drainage), environmental scientists, agricultural policy makers, and hydrologists.

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Books in Crop nutrients and nutrition

Nitrogen in the Environment: Sources, Problems and Management

Silicon in Agriculture

Advances in Agronomy

Nitrogen Management and Ground Water Protection