Book chapter
Ecological Microbiology
Sergei Vinogradskii and the Cycle of Life, pp 125-137
08 Aug 2012
Abstract
Vinogradskii first addressed the subject of ecology in his discussion of soil microflora. Attempting to alleviate the haphazard nature of soil microflora research, he proposed an ecological definition of that field. Envisioning the soil as “a dumping ground for all waste,” he assumed that all germs would be able to live in it at some time and in some place depending on their nutritional needs and the local soil conditions. The category “soil microflora” would thus necessarily include almost all known species, ranging from the nitrifiers, fixers, humivores, and other autochthonous microbes to the bacteria buried with cadavers. In order to make ecological sense of this wide variation and local dependency of the soil microbial population, he proposed limiting the term “soil microflora” to encompass “the microbes especially adapted to a life in the soil environment.” Recognizing that this environment could be—and in his experience often was—“dirtied” (souille) by foreign decomposing materials, he clarified that by “soil” he meant “biologically normal mineral soil.” Although this type of soil does not contain organic substances in the process of fermentation, some substances may have begun to degrade to a comparatively stable stage. At this stage of development, the soil contains substances known as humiques. It was only here, in this normal soil that the true microflora lived.
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Details
- Title
- Ecological Microbiology
- Creators
- Lloyd Ackert - Department of History and Politics, Drexel University, Philadelphia, USA
- Publication Details
- Sergei Vinogradskii and the Cycle of Life, pp 125-137
- Series
- Archimedes
- Publisher
- Springer Netherlands; Dordrecht
- Resource Type
- Book chapter
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- History
- Scopus ID
- 2-s2.0-85102016152
- Other Identifier
- 991019174549004721