LABORATORY FOR TESTING SOIL, FERTILIZERS AND PLANT MATERIAL

Department for Plant Material Testing

Department Activities

The Department for Plant Material Testing performs various analyses of plant material, which include sample preparation procedures, statistical processing of results, and providing advice and recommendations.

The activities of the Department for Plant Material Testing include: (1) Determining the supply of plants with essential nutrients, namely: total N (Kjeldahl), nitrates, macronutrient content (P, K, Ca, Mg), micronutrient content (Fe, Cu, B, Zn, Mn, Na, Ni); (2) Determining the presence and content of undesirable elements such as harmful heavy metals (Cd, Pb); (3) Conducting experiments to examine the impact of specific factors on plant metabolism (e.g., the effect of new plant nutrition products); (4) Analyzing water regime parameters (total and relative water content, measuring water potential, transpiration, number and density of stomata, critical water deficit in plants); (5) Determining photosynthesis parameters (chlorophyll and carotenoid content, SPAD values, chlorophyll fluorescence parameters, biomass production); (6) Determining stress indicators (concentration of free proline, malondialdehyde (MDA), vitamin C, hydrogen peroxide, phenolic compounds, …); (7) Measuring enzyme activity (nitrate reductase, amylase, urease, …)

Scope of Testing

The equipment of the Laboratory of the Department of Field and Vegetable Crops and the Department for Plant Material Testing enables the determination of a series of parameters in plant tissues:

Preparation of plant tissue samples for analysis (drying, grinding of samples);
Setting up experiments and growing plants under semi-controlled conditions;
Chemical analysis of plant tissue (determining plant supply with essential macro- and micro-nutrients as well as determining the concentration of undesirable elements in plant tissues) using UV/VIS spectrophotometry, atomic absorption spectrophotometry (AAS), and flame photometry;
Determination of the SPAD photosynthesis parameter;
Determination of photosynthetic pigment concentration (chlorophyll and carotenoids);
Measurement of chlorophyll fluorescence;
Microscopic analyses using a light microscope (stomata);
Biochemical analyses (determining nitrate concentration in plant tissues, analysis of biochemical stress indicators);
Measurement of water regime parameters and biomass production;
Statistical processing of analysis results;
Providing recommendations.