Abstract

                                It has been almost definitely established by soil scientists that 37-50 per cent of the nitrogen of the soil is of proteinaceous nature. Though considerable work has been done along these lines in other countries no work has been done so far on the nature of soil nitrogen in the soils of South India with special reference to amino acid distribution patterns. The object of the present investigation, reported in this section, is to detect the protein components i. e., amino acids of soil hydrolysates and identification of the amino acids present in the typical soil types of the Madras and Kerala States of South India.

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