Promoting microbial nitrogen cycling to improve crop nitrogen availability

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Current levels of nitrogen fertilizer application to crops are unsustainable because of rising energy costs and environmental damage. Plant root exudates can alter the activity of N cycling soil microbes and this could provide a route to more efficient N-fertilisation. However, the mechanisms governing root exudate activity remain obscure. The aim here is to use Arabidopsis and crop mutants to understand how plants manipulate microbial N cycling. Plant N preference is affected by a number of factors including carbon status. Genetically defined mutants with altered numbers of stomata will allow the dissection of mechanisms.