Líffræðifélag Íslands - biologia.is
Líffræðiráðstefnan 2025
Erindi/veggspjald / Talk/poster V36
Höfundar / Authors: Kolfinna Ólafsdóttir (1), Margrét Auður Sigurbjörnsdóttir (1,2), Eva María Ingvadóttir (1,2)
Starfsvettvangur / Affiliations: 1. Háskólinn á Akureyri, 2. Náttúrufræðistofnun
Kynnir / Presenter: Kolfinna Ólafsdóttir
Icelandic soil, influenced by volatile volcanic activity and unforgiving Arctic weather, does not favor vegetation and is particularly sensitive to erosion causing eroded land to be a common part of Icelandic nature. Bacterial communities have been shown to play a key role in soil health, where they contribute to ecosystem dynamics, influence plant growth and even mitigate land desertification. The thesis aims to explore restoration alternative with a modern and environmentally friendly approach, utilizing soil bacteria as a sustainable form of natural fertilizer for restoration of eroded landscapes. Bacterial isolates from prior studies, originally extracted from Icelandic Arctic soil, were selected for pretesting of potential plant growth promoting abilities such as production of plant hormones(indole acetic acid), siderophore production, nitrogen fixing and phosphate solubilizing. Based on these results, 3 strains were chosen for further experiments on real life birch saplings. The saplings were inoculated with each strain and incubated for 16 weeks after which the saplings as well as soil were assessed, both visually and chemically. The birch saplings showed health improvements, especially antifungal resistance against rust fungi when inoculated with the selected strains, supporting the hypothesis that using bacteria as natural fertilizer could be a feasible option in the restoration of eroded Icelandic landscapes.