Biological Nitrogen Fixation—early American Style

How crops grow; a century later

“…In Johnson's book there is also an account of the researches of Ville, who claimed that both legumes and non-legumes could utilize nitrogen from the atmosphere. Johnson (28) presented a clear description of the complex experiments of Lawes, Gilbert and Pugh, in which both legumes and non-leguminous plants were grown in calcined soil under conditions where contamination by fixed forms of nitrogen was highly improbable.From the data collected they were forced to conclude that neither legumes nor non-legumes possess a capacity to utilize nitrogen gas, but they failed to recognize that micro-organisms normally present in soils were eliminated by heating the soil and thus had no opportunity to participate in symbiotic nitrogen fixation.Professor Perry Wilson(47) has presented an informative account of the establishment of the early experiment stations in the United States, including interesting facts about the first one at WesleyanUniversity in Connecticut under the directorship of W. O. Atwater. Atwater conducted experiments on the nutrition of peas and published results in 1885 (…”