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66 SEEDWORLD.COM DECEMBER 2015 F ARMERS GROWING SOYBEANS in the 1800s would notice that the crop did quite well in certain fields while struggling in others. Water climate and other variables the same they assumed there was something about the soil and they were right. Invisible to the naked eye and unbeknownst to those farmers microbes rhizobia in particular were interacting with soy- beans and significantly increasing the amount of nitrogen taken up from the soil by the plants. Its one of the first instances of the agricultural world coming to understand the role microbes play in improving crops. Farmers inoculated their own soil then. They would spread soil known to lead to nitrogen-fixing nodules from one field to other fields that did not lead to nodules on soybean roots according to the book History of Soybeans and Soyfoods in the United Kingdom and Ireland 1613-2015. These are symbiotic relationships that have been going on since the beginning of time. The plant feeds the microbe and the microbe is giving the plant some benefit says Marcus Meadows- Smith chief executive officer at BioConsortia Inc. a research and development company based in Davis California that focuses on agricultural microbes. What the agricultural world would come to understand is that these microbes the bacteria and fungi present in abundance in soil werent only responsible for the blights mildews cankers leaf spots rots and other diseases that farmers fight against come from microbes. They were always there in the soil doing unseen good increasing root size warding off pests and increas- ing plants abilities to pull needed nutrients from the soil. Theyre all natural and native to the environment says Robert Shortell vice president of global marketing at Houston- based Stoller Group a company that produces products aimed at increasing crop yields. Were just starting to learn about these things. A lot of our newer molecular techniques allow us to iden- tify the positive ones now. Estimates vary but there are more microbes in one gram of soil just a fraction of an ounce than people on the planet pos- sibly several times more. And many of those billions of organ- ism are in some way affecting the plants with which they come into contact. They all interact with the plant in some way. Were looking at utilizing what nature gave us identifying and singling out the microbes that have a benefit on certain crops in certain condi- tions says Colin Bletsky vice president of the BioAg Team at Novozymes a biotechnology company based in Denmark. There are billions of opportunities. Those beneficial microbes as we now understand are a part of a complex mix that compete underground for survival much like crops and weeds compete on the surface. On the surface farmers are constantly stacking the deck in favor of the crops by spraying herbicides and promoting faster growth for the crops to outcompete the weeds. And in the same way companies and researchers are finding ways to increase the likelihood of beneficial microbes coming into play with crops and keeping the negative ones at bay. Our entire history of agriculture has been spent on killing negative pathogens Shortell says. We are creating less food and space for the bad ones to survive. Symbiotic Relationships When those 19th-century farmers moved good soybean soil into their fields what they were really doing was transferring rhizobia. As soybean seeds germinate their roots send out nutrients that trigger chemical reactions in nearby rhizobia bacteria. The bacteria bond with the root hairs and the roots form nodules around the bacteria. Beneficial bacteria show promise for environment bottom lines. Brian Wallheimer Microbials Becoming Mainstream Colorful microbes form consortia in this slide. PHOTOBIOCONSORTIA.