Study on the Hydroponic Culture of Lettuce with Microbially Degraded Solid Food Waste as a Nitrate Source

Japan Agricultural Research Quarterly
ISSN 00213551
NII recode ID (NCID) AA0068709X
Full text
48-01-10.pdf502.31 KB

It is important to use food waste as organic fertilizer because considerable energy is needed to produce inorganic fertilizer, while most food waste is burned and landfilled. Recently, a groundbreaking method, organic hydroponics, has been developed, which enables the cultivation of vegetables by directly adding organic fertilizers to the hydroponic solution. Organic fertilizer is degraded to mineral nutrients by a microbial method, multiple parallel mineralization, involving concurrent ammonification and nitrification reactions. Previous studies have shown vegetables thriving when raised on liquid organic fertilizers via organic hydroponics. However, cultivation using solid organic fertilizers has yet to be examined. In this study, we examined the feasibility of using solid food waste generated from a shopping center as a fertilizer for organic hydroponics. We confirmed nitrate ion generation from the food waste by multiple parallel mineralization. Using solid organic matter and the anaerobic conditions at the bottom of a rectangular container might stimulate denitrification. We improved the retrieval rate of inorganic nitrogen ions by filtrating the solution with a nonwoven fabric bag to remove undegraded organic matter and successfully cultivated butterhead lettuce using the food waste as fertilizer in the hydroponics. The results provided a methodological basis for a new effective means of recycling food waste.

Date of issued
Creator KAWAMURA-AOYAMA Chihiro FUJIWARA Kazuki SHINOHARA Makoto TAKANO Masao
Subject

biofilm

filtration

microbial ecosystem

multiple parallel mineralization

nitrogen fertilizer

Publisher Japan International Research Center for Agricultural Sciences
Available Online
NII resource type vocabulary Journal Article
Volume 48
Issue 1
spage 71
epage 76
DOI 10.6090/jarq.48.71
Rights Japan International Research Center for Agricultural Sciences
Language eng

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