• Korean Journal of Soil Science and Fertilizer
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• v.31 no.2
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• pp.128-136
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• 1998

Most of total nitrogen in the surface soil exists in organic forms, of which amino acid-N is the major fraction. By-product fertilizers provide soil with humic substances, and humic acid is an essential component of humus. Amino acids(AAs) are easily converted to inorganic-N forms and thus play an important role in N fertility. This experiment was conducted to investigate the contents and distributions of AAs in humic acids which were extracted from the commercial by-product fertilizers of different composting materials. Total contents of AAs in humic acids ranged from 1.2 to 5.6%, of which neutral AAs were the highest with ranges of 0.8~4.5%. AAs contents in fertilizers composted from the plant residues such as leaf litter, sawdust and bark were in an order of neutral>acidic>basic AAs. In contrast, those from animal wastes, such as poultry and pig manures, were in an order of neutral>basic>acidic AAs. Distributions of total, acidic and neutral AAs were in the respective order of leaf litter>sawdust>pig manure>poultry manure>peat, bark>sawdust>leaf litter>peat and leaf litter>sawdust>bark>peat. Distributions of the basic AAs were in the reversed order of the acidic AAs. In bark fertilizer with increasing compost maturity, contents of the acidic AAs were increased in compensation for the decreases in those of neutral and basic AAs. Results demonstrated that distributions of amino acids in humic acid of by-product fertilizers were different from composting raw materials and degrees of humification.

• Journal of Environmental Science International
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.279-286
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• 2006

Electrokinetic technique was considered in removing arsenic from the abandoned mining tails. In order to estimate the removal characteristics of arsenic, the sequential extraction analysis and desorption experiment were carried out prior to the application of electrokientic process. The result of sequential extraction analysis indicated that the water soluble and exchangeable fraction, easily leachable to ground water, were very low as much as about 2.5% and the fraction except residual (38.3%), possibly extractable under very acidic or alkalic environment, was about 59%. In the result of desorption test using four different kinds of electrolytes, the mixture of citric acid and sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) showed the highest desorption efficiency as much as 77.3%. The removal efficiencies of arsenic from mining tailings by electrokinetic process under the different electrolyte environments were slightly low and resulted in the following order: citric acid + SDS (18.6%) > 0.1 $NHNO_3$ (8.1%) > HAc (7.4%) > Distilled water(6.6%). Also, arsenic in soil matrix was moved favorably in the direction of anodic rather than cathodic region, which is opposite trend with cationic metal ions generally existing in soil, because anionic form of arsenic is dominated in acidic soil caused by the movement of acid front form anode.

• Journal of Microbiology and Biotechnology
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• v.27 no.12
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• pp.2180-2189
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• 2017

Psychrophilic phytases suitable for aquaculture are rare. In this study, a phytase of the histidine acid phosphatase (HAP) family was identified in Morchella importuna, a psychrophilic mushroom. The phytase showed 38% identity with Aspergillus niger PhyB, which was the closest hit. The M. importuna phytase was overexpressed in Pichia pastoris, purified, and characterized. The phytase had an optimum temperature at $25^{\circ}C$, which is the lowest among all the known phytases to our best knowledge. The optimum pH (6.5) is higher than most of the known HAP phytases, which is fit for the weak acidic condition in fish gut. At the optimum pH and temperature, MiPhyA showed the maximum activity level ($2,384.6{\pm}90.4{\mu}mol{\cdot}min^{-1}{\cdot}mg^{-1}$, suggesting that the enzyme possesses a higher activity level over many known phytases at low temperatures. The phytate-degrading efficacy was tested on three common feed materials (soybean meal/rapeseed meal/corn meal) and was compared with the well-known phytases of Escherichia coli and A. niger. When using the same amount of activity units, MiPhyA could yield at least $3{\times}$ more inorganic phosphate than the two reference phytases. When using the same weight of protein, MiPhyA could yield at least $5{\times}$ more inorganic phosphate than the other two. Since it could degrade phytate in feed materials efficiently under low temperature and weak acidic conditions, which are common for aquacultural application, MiPhyA might be a promising candidate as a feed additive enzyme.

• Korean Journal of Soil Science and Fertilizer
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• v.40 no.5
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• pp.412-417
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• 2007

This study was to elucidate the effects of layered double hydroxides(LDHs) application on the chemical properties of the soils along with the fate of the applied LDHs. The effects of LDHs application were compared with those of calcium carbonate widely used for the neutralization of acidic soils. Incorporation of LDHs into the soil resulted in higher pH value and $Mg^{2+}$ content in soil leachate than that of $CaCO_3$ treatment. There was no significant difference in water-soluble P content in both the treatments. However, $Al^{3+}$ and $Si^{4+}$ contents were decreased by LDHs and $CaCO_3$ treatment, even though a large amount of $Al^{3+}$ was released into soil solution with the disintegration of LDHs framework. LDHs structure in soil was gradually disintegrated from the its original layered structure under acidic condition of soil. Therefore, this study suggests that LDHs could be utilized as a carrier of functional substances to enhance the efficiency of various ago-chemicals without any ill effects on the soil environments.

• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2003.03a
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• pp.641-646
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• 2003

In this study, a series of electrokinetic(EK) remediation experiments are carried out under the different degree of saturation for contaminated soil with lead. for constant electrical potential, the final current of all the sample represents the similarity to steady-state value of 5∼7mA. Under conditions of all the degree of saturation the anode reservoir becomes acidic(pH as low as 3) while the cathode reservoir is basic(pH as high as 12). But pH changes in the sample is a little and decontamination efficiency is the low.

• Proceedings of the Korean Geotechical Society Conference
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• 2003.03a
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• pp.821-826
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• 2003

Laboratory experiments were peformed to understand physical properties of soil-cement column under the influence of acidic flow including metal contaminants and its retaining capacity against metal migration. The contaminant used in this study was nitric acid with Cu and Cd. The Permeability of soil-cement column decreased when pH of the column began to drop below 12. Decreases in pH led to significant reduction of compressive strength of clayey soil-cement specimen, while relatively marginal reduction for sandy soil-cement specimen. The metal contaminants did not leachate from soil-cement column until pH of soil-cement dropped below 7∼8 for Cu and 9∼10 for Cd. Metal contaminants were precipitated and trapped inside the soil-cement column at pHs higher than those mentioned as verified with metal analysis and visual inspection. This indicated that soil-cement column not only performs well as a cut-off wall, but also helps alleviating the level of contamination of the surrounding environment.

• Proceedings of the Korean Society of Soil and Groundwater Environment Conference
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• 2004.04a
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• pp.239-242
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• 2004

Pilot-scale soil washing facility was developed and operation condition was determined in order to remediate a soil contaminated with As, Ni and Zn. Soil washing facility is composed of soil particle separation, soil washing and wastewater treatment process. Both oxyanionic As and cationic Ni and Zn were effciently removed using HCl rather 0than H$_2$SO$_4$ and H$_2$PO$_4$. This is why oxyanion and cation metals can be extracted simultaneously from the contaminated soil in acidic solution. Further, the contaminated soils include calcite and then demand much acidity, that is consumption of acid solution. Fine particles are enriched with contaminants, and coarse particles are removed effectively rather than fine particles. As, Ni and Zn are strongly associated with minerals, and then the residence time should be increased for a reaction with washing solution.

• Journal of Forest and Environmental Science
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• v.31 no.4
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• pp.280-287
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• 2015

Soil samples were collected from three depths (0-10 cm, 10-40 cm and 40-80 cm) of two forest sites including one plantation dominated by teak with some other minor species and another degraded natural forest in Cox's Bazar, Bangladesh to compare their soil properties. Some vegetation parameters were also studied. For this study $10{\times}10\;m$ and $2{\times}2\;m$ quadrats were used for the tree and undergrowth parameters, respectively. Soil samples were also collected from these quadrats. Between the two forest types, the highest levels of organic carbon, total nitrogen, available phosphorus, exchangeable bases and cation exchange capacity (CEC) were found in soils of the plantation. The soils were acidic in nature and exchangeable Al concentrations were low. Teak dominated forest plantation had higher soil fertility index (SFI) than the degraded natural forest site. Steps for reforestation and appropriate protection are needed to improve the situation.

• The Korean Journal of Ecology
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• v.28 no.6
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• pp.417-431
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• 2005

Soils of Korea experienced with long-term acidic deposition have been exhaustively leached exchangeable base cation (BC) for plant nutrient comparable with soils of forest decline areas in Europe and N. America. Ratios of $BC/Al^{3+}$ of most soils are below than 1, which value is critical load for plant growth. Acid soil applied with dolomitic liming is increased as much as 20% and 244% in concentrations of $Ca^{2+}$ and $Mg^{2+}$, respectively, as well as shrub leaves increase much cation uptake by 1 year later. Ions of $NO_3^-$ and $NH_4^+$ in acid rain are absorbed by the canopy acted as the sink but f is leached out from the canopy to throughfall as the source at Gwangneung forest with a little of acidic deposition, however, such sink and source functions are not found at Kwanaksan forest because of so much deposition. In coniferous and deciduous forested watershed ecosystems ions of $K^+$, $Cl^-$, $NO_3^-$ and $SO_4^{2-}$ from throughfall are retained in forest floor but ions of $Na^+, $Mg^{2+}$ and $Ca^{2+}$ are leached from the floor to streamwater.

• Korean Journal of Environment and Ecology
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• v.15 no.3
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• pp.230-236
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• 2001

The fluxes of wet deposition(WD), throughfall(TF), stemflow(SF) and soil leachates were measured to understand base cation budgets on deciduous ecosystem impacted by acidic deposition in the north-western part of Tomakomai in Hokkaido, Japan. The flux of $H^{+}$ for wet deposition was $0.34kmo1_{c}$ $ha^{2+}$ and the flux of base cation, $K^{+}$ /, Na$^{ + }$, $Ca^{2+}$ and $Mg^{2+}$ far throughfall plus stemflow wart 1.6 kmolc $ha^{-1}$ , 3 times higher level than that for wet deposition. The flux of base cation for canopy leaching(LI) was 0.95 kmolc ha$^{-1}$ , 2.8 times higher level than $H^{+}$ sources in wet deposition. The major mechanism of $^{+}$ consumption closely related to acidic neutralizing capacity of canopy. The ionic flux for soil leachates from Boil reservoir and proton consumption in soil was dependent on soil chemical states and exchangeable Ca in soil had a major factor of H$^{+ }$ consumption. The base cation budgets on deciduous ecosystem showed positive balance fur Na, Ca and Mg, while K was the negative value.