With growing concern about the protection of soil quality and biodiversity many countries have established regional and national programmes to monitor soil quality. This book reviews the theory and practice of a range of the various microbiological methods used within these programmes. The first section gives an overview of approaches to monitoring, evaluating and managing soil quality. The second section provides a practical handbook with detailed descriptions of the methods. The methods are described in chapters on soil microbial biomass and numbers, soil microbial activity, soil microbial diversity and community composition, and plant-microbe interactions and soil quality. Finally, a census is given of the main methods used in over 30 European microbiological laboratories.
Part I. Approaches to Defining, Monitoring, Evaluating and Managing Soil Quality; Introduction, A Benedetti and O Dilly; Defining Soil Quality - R G Burns, P Nannipieri, A Benedetti and D W Hopkins; Monitoring and Evaluating Soil Quality - J Bloem, A J Schouten, S J Sorensen, M Rutgers, A van der Werf and A M Breure; Managing Soil Quality - M Schloter, J C Munch and F Tittarelli; Conclusive Remarks - A Benedetti, P C Brookes and J M Lynch; Part II. Selected Methods; Microbial Biomass and Numbers; Estimating soil microbial biomass - A Fliessbach and F Widmer; Microbial biomass measurements by fumigation-extraction - P Brookes and R G Joergensen; Substrate-induced respiration - H Hoper; Enumeration and Biovolume Determination of Microbial Cells - M Bolter, J Bloem, K Meiners and R Moller; Soil Microbial Activity; Estimating soil microbial activity, O Dilly; Soil respiration - M Pell, J Stenstrom and U Granhall; Soil nitrogen mineralization - S Canall and A Benedetti; Nitrification in soil - A Bollmann; Thymidine and leucine incorporation to assess bacterial growth rate - J Bloem and P R Bolhuls; N2O emissions and denitrification from soil - U Sehy, M Schloter, H Bothe and J C Munch; Enzyme activity profiles and soil quality - L J Shaw and R G Burns; Soil Microbial Diversity and Community Composition; Estimating soil microbial diversity and community composition - J D van Elsas and M Rutgers; Soil microbial community fingerprinting based on total community DNA or RNA - J D van Elsas, E M Top and K Smalla; Phospholipid fatty acid (PLFA) analyses - A Palojarvi; Substrate utilisation in Biolog plates for analysis of CLPP - M Rutgers, A M Breure and H Insam; Plant-microbe Interactions and Soil Quality; Microbial ecology of the rhizosphere - P Lemanceau, P Offre, C Maugel, E Gamalero, Y Dessaux, Y Moenne-Loccoz and G Berta; Nodulating symbiotic bacteria and soil quality - A Hartmann, S Mazurier, D N Rodriguez-Navarro, F Temprano Vera, J-C Cleyet-Marel, Y Prin, A Galiana, M Fernandez-Lopez, N Tora and Y Moenne-Loccoz; Contribution of arbuscular mycorrhiza to soil quality and terrestrial ecotoxicology - S Gianinazzi, E Plumey-Jacquot, V Gianinazzi-Pearson and C Leyval; Concepts and methods to assess the phytosanitary quality of soils - C Alabouvette, J Raaijmakers, W de Boer, R Notz, G Defago, C Steinberg and P Lemanceau; Free-living plant-beneficial microorganisms and soil quality - Y Moenne-Loccoz, S L Woo, Y Okon, R Bally, M Lorito, P Lemanceau and A Hartmann; Census of Microbiological Methods for Soil Quality - O Dilly