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ABSTRACT
Samples of 14 neighboring fields of Histosols (organic soils) were similar in all but one of their 24 physical and chemical properties examined. The Cu content of these soils varied from 18 to 275 µg/g. Activities of C1-cellulase, Cx-cellulase, cellobiase, xylanase, amylase, inulase, lichenase, and lipase enzymes in the air-dried and stored soil samples were found to correlate posiitvely with soil respiration and negatively with soil Cu content. Similarly, when samples from many border strips kept free of plants by cultivation in the same 14 fields were collected, air-dried at about 23°C, and assayed within 1 week in summer, soluble Cu content of the soils was found to be negatively correlated with the cellobiase and invertase activities, and the enzyme activity levels similar to those of the air-dried samples in storage for 2 years. Evidence presented therefore supports earlier suggestions that Cu may restrain the mineralization and subsidence of some organic soils through inactivation by the Cu of certain extracellular soil enzymes which normally facilitate biochemical oxidation of nonhumic soil organic matter.
1 Contribution no. 1090 from the Chemistry and Biology Research Inst., Research Branch, Agriculture Canada, Ottawa, Ont. Canada, K1A 0C6.
2 Senior Research Scientist, Soil Biochemistry & Microbiology, and Technical Associate, respectively.
Received for publication April 30, 1979. Accepted for publication March 18, 1980.
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