Herrmann, Anke
- Department of Soil Sciences, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
Research article2005Peer reviewed
Interference by amino acids during the determination of N-15 ammonium in soil
Herrmann A, Willett VB, Stockdale EA, Jones DL
Abstract
In the study of terrestrial N cycling, NH4+ concentration and N-15 enrichment are routinely determined by colorimetric continuous flow analysis and microdiffusion methods. Amino acids can interfere in these determinations; consequently the aim of the present study was to evaluate the significance of the interference. Glycine and glutamine are key amino acids in soil and were therefore used as 'models'. Both glycine and glutamine interfered during continuous flow analysis, whereas interference during microdiffusion was of little importance. The effects of interference can be significant, e.g. estimates of gross mineralisation rate were reduced up to 33 %, where we allowed for amino acid interference during determination of NH4+ concentration. The potential influence of amino acid interference emphasises that development of continuous flow analysis to increase NH4+ specificity is needed. (c) 2005 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved
Published in
Soil Biology and Biochemistry
2005, Volume: 37, number: 9, pages: 1747-1750
Publisher: PERGAMON-ELSEVIER SCIENCE LTD
SLU Authors
UKÄ Subject classification
Agricultural Science
Publication identifier
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.soilbio.2005.02.008
Permanent link to this page (URI)
https://res.slu.se/id/publ/6717