• Journal of Korean Society of Forest Science
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• v.86 no.1
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• pp.98-104
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• 1997

Soil pollution intensity at Mt. Namsan in Seoul city which was expected to show significant soil contamination due to long-term air pollution was evaluated by comparing soil chemical properties at Mt. Kyebangsan in Hongcheon area as a control, and the bacteria participating in nitrogen or sulfur mineralization were assayed simultaneously in order to evaluate the validity of N and/or S mineralization bacteria as an index of soil contamination. The soil of Mt. Namsan showed 10 times higher concentration of hydrogen ion compared to that of Mt. Kyebangsan, which indicated that the soil had relatively been acidified seriously. Especially, large amount of canons were thought to be leached out from the soil, while the amount of extractable Al was getting larger and larger, which result in serious problems in soil ecosystem of the mountain. I could infer from soil chemical properties of the four study sites that the major reason of soil acidification was SOx deposition. However, the sulfur-reducing bacteria were not significantly different between the two regions, which indicated that the microbial dynamics of the soil ecosystem was not controlled by simple factor, but by multiple factors. By the way, the dynamics of bacteria participating in denitrification process was different between the two regions, which was more active at Mt. Kyebangsan than at Mt. Namsan. Thus, the microbial assay for nitrogen mineralization is desirable to be examined as a tool for evaluating soil health or microbial activity in soil ecosystem.