Newly recognized vital nitrogen cycle

Estimates of Denitrification and Nitrification in Coastal and Estuarine Sediments

Denitrification and nitrification in sediments of Tama Estuary and Odawa Bay, Japan, were investigated by the combined use of a continuous-flow sediment-water system and a 15 N tracer technique. At Odawa Bay, the nitrification rate was comparable to the nitrate reduction rate, and 70% of the N 2 evolved originated from nitrogenous oxides (nitrate and nitrite) which were produced by the action of nitrifying bacteria in the sediments. At Tama Estuary, the nitrate reduction rate was 11 to 17 times higher than the nitrification rate, and nitrogenous oxides derived from ammonium accounted for only 6 to 9% of the N 2 evolution by denitrification.

Nitrous Oxide: Emission from Soils During Nitrification of Fertilizer Nitrogen

Nitrous oxide is released from soils to the atmosphere during nitrification of ammonium and ammonium-producing fertilizers under aerobic conditions as well as by denitrification of nitrate under anaerobic conditions. Emissions of nitrous oxide during nitrification of fertilizer nitrogen may be significant in regard to the potential threat of fertilizer-derived nitrous oxide to the stratospheric ozone layer. Such emissions can be greatly reduced through the use of nitrapyrin, which inhibits nitrification of ammonium by soil microorganisms.

Two kinds of lithotrophs missing in nature

Two groups of lithotrophic bacteria, the existence of which may be expected on evolutionary and thermodynamical grounds, have not yet been detected: (A) photosynthetic, anaerobic, ammonia bacteria, analogous to coloured sulphur bacteria, and (B) chemosynthetic bacteria that oxidize ammonia to nitrogen with O2 or nitrate as oxidant.

The history of inorganic nitrogen in the biosphere

When in the primeval atmosphere ammonia approached exhaustion, bacteria resembling clostridia developed mechanisms for nitrogen fixation. The fixation was continued by the photosynthetic bacteria. In the later, oxidizing, atmosphere the combined activities of the nitrificants and the denitrificants could lead to a large-scale cyclic regeneration of free nitrogen. The possibility of a descent of the nitrificants from hypothetical photosynthetic bacteria, which used ammonia as electron donor, is discussed. The anoxygenic atmosphere contained no nitrate, and therefore neither nitrate fermentation nor nitrate respiration were precursors of aerobic respiration. This evolved from photosynthesis. In nitrate fermentation, nitrate serves only as an incidental electron acceptor; this process is merely an evolutionary sideline. Nitrate respiration evolved from aerobic respiration. While in present conditions the reaction of nitrogen with oxygen and water to give nitrate is exergonic and possibly occurs at a low rate, the antagonistic action of the denitrificants maintains the stationary concentrations of nitrogen and oxygen in the air.