Amino sugar nitrogen and soil organic matter in various putting green soils

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The Illinois Soil Nitrogen Test (ISNT) measures amino sugar nitrogen and has been used as an index of a soil's mineralizable N. When Micah Woods was a graduate student at Cornell University, he collected a range of putting green soil samples from around the world with a range of soil organic matter contents. For some of these soils, he compared the soil organic matter measured by loss on ignition with the ISNT measure for the same soil. There was a linear relationship between the soil organic matter and the ISNT, indicating that for the soils tested, the soil organic matter content itself may be sufficient as an indicator of the soil's mineralizable nitrogen.

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