Reducing synthetic fertilizer use, pollution, and farming costs, while freeing up nitrogen, mark possible benefits of a research project by Sarah Roley, assistant professor with the School of the Environment, Washington State University Tri-Cities.
Roley and her two colleagues, recently landed a $483,000 research grant from the National Science Foundation, to pursue a more detailed understanding of how bacteria work with perennial grasses to fix nitrogen.
Every living organism requires nitrogen to survive, and nitrogen fixation is a critical step in biology. Fixation is the conversion of nitrogen in the atmosphere to ammonia, a form of nitrogen that can be used by plants and microbes, and subsequently move up the food web.
“Nitrogen goes into our protein and DNA,” Roley said. “From bacteria, to plants, to humans, we all need it, and we need a lot of it.”
Little is known, however, about nitrogen fixation in perennial grasses, Roley said. By better identifying how that process occurs, significant progress may be made in reducing the amount of synthetic nitrogen needed for fertilizing crops, as well as the amount of pollution that stems from the creation and use of synthetic fertilizers.
Roley’s research will focus on switchgrass. But, study findings may apply to other perennial grasses—ryegrass, bluegrass, and fescues. The research may potentially lead to discoveries about a variety of other plants and how nitrogen fixation occurs within them.