Wood-rotting fungus turns forest waste into compost that grows bigger plants
Sun ML, Qin HL, Cui ZY, Ren Y, Yang J
Composting
The leaf litter, branches, and wood chips piled up after pruning can become a compost that feeds your soil and recruits helpful root-zone bacteria, if you speed up the breakdown with a lignin-digesting fungus.
Researchers added a wood-rotting fungus to a pile of forest waste, and it broke down tough wood fibers much faster than normal composting. The finished compost fed pepper plants and young Chinese fir trees, and their growth improved. It also drew in more kinds of helpful bacteria around the roots, and a blend of just those bacteria gave a similar boost.
Key Findings
Inoculating forest-residue compost with the white-rot fungus Bjerkandera adusta QX3-19 substantially enhanced lignocellulose degradation and produced a nutrient-rich biofertilizer (BBF).
BBF significantly promoted growth of both Capsicum annuum (pepper) and Cunninghamia lanceolata (Chinese fir), and increased rhizosphere microbial diversity and network complexity.
A synthetic community built from BBF-enriched plant growth-promoting bacteria reproduced the growth-promoting effect, and BBF raised genes tied to chemotaxis, flagellar assembly, and nutrient mineralization.
chevron_right Technical Summary
Composting forest waste with a wood-rotting fungus produced a nutrient-rich fertilizer that boosted growth in pepper and Chinese fir. It also reshaped the root-zone microbes, and a mix of the helpful bacteria alone reproduced the growth boost.
Abstract Preview
Original paper
Fungal-augmented biofertilizer increases soil nutrient availability, alters rhizosphere community structure, and improves plant growth.
Converting lignocellulosic waste into biofertilizers offers a sustainable practice for waste valorization, yet the mechanistic links underpinning how such amendments affect the soil-plant system re...
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Cunninghamia is a genus of one or two living species of evergreen coniferous trees in the cypress family Cupressaceae. They are native to China, northern Vietnam and Laos, and perhaps also Cambodia. They may reach 70 m (230 ft) in height. In vernacular use, it is most often known as Cunninghamia,...