Abstract
Biochar and arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) can promote plant growth, improve soil properties, and maintain microbial activity. The effects of biochar and AMF on plant growth, root morphological traits, physiological properties, and soil enzymatic activities were studied in spinach (Spinacia oleracea L.). A pot experiment was conducted to evaluate the effect of biochar and AMF on the growth of spinach. Four treatments, a T1 control (soil without biochar), T2 biochar alone, T3 AMF alone, and T4 biochar and AMF together, were arranged in a randomized complete block design with five replications. The biochar alone had a positive effect on the growth of spinach, root morphological traits, physiological properties, and soil enzymatic activities. It significantly increased the plant growth parameters, such as the shoot length, leaf number, leaf length, leaf width, shoot fresh weight, and shoot dry weight. The root morphological traits, plant physiological attributes, and soil enzymatic activities were significantly enhanced with the biochar alone compared with the control. However, the combination of biochar and AMF had a greater impact on the increase in plant growth, root morphological traits, physiological properties, and soil enzymatic activities compared with the other treatments. The results suggested that the combined biochar and AMF led to the highest levels of spinach plant growth, microbial biomass, and soil enzymatic activity.
Highlights
Biochar is the carbon-rich material taken by pyrolysis using various biomasses
We investigated the effect of the combined application of biochar and arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) on spinach growth, root morphological traits, physiological properties, and soil enzymatic activities
Similar results were reported by Budi and Setyaningsih [65]; their study showed that biochar and AMF significantly increased the plant height, diameter, shoot dry weight, and root dry weight compared to the control plant
Summary
Biochar is the carbon-rich material taken by pyrolysis using various biomasses. Biochar plays an important role in decreasing global warming in the world and reducing atmospheric CO2 concentrations, as well as improving soil used in agriculture [1,2,3,4,5,6]. Biochar application has been noted to increase the activity of microbes in the soil and improve the physical and chemical properties of the soil [7,8,9,10,11,12,13]. Scisłowska et al [14] observed that biochar treatments improved the quality and productivity of soils. Laird et al [15] reported that biochar treatments significantly increased the water-holding capacity, cation exchange capacity, and specific surface area of soils. Rice husk biochar significantly increased the organic matter in soil by 52.94% compared with the control [16]. Numerous reports have indicated that biochar alone increased the activities of dehydrogenase, alkaline phosphatase, acid phosphatase, acid phosphomonoesterase, alkaline phosphomonoesterase, protease, chymotrypsin, trypsin, phosphohydrolase, lipase-esterase, and esterase enzymes [17,18,19]
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