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Use of Deep-Freezing in the Preservation and Preparation of Fresh Soil Samples

Abstract

IN the course of determining the levels of mineral nitrogen in soils, and the extra amounts produced on incubation, a method of maintaining soil samples in their field condition was required. The use of chemical inhibitors to stop microbiological activity was rejected since these change the balance of the soil micro-organisms. A further difficulty was that when arable land is sampled in the winter or early spring the structure of medium and heavy textured soils is destroyed by the operations involved. It was hoped that maintaining soils about freezing point would arrest microbiological activity without altering the results of subsequent incubation and also that freezing would restore or even improve the structure.

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References

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GASSER, J. Use of Deep-Freezing in the Preservation and Preparation of Fresh Soil Samples. Nature 181, 1334–1335 (1958). https://doi.org/10.1038/1811334b0

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