Researchers found that iron oxides in soil catalyze reactions that produce phosphorus, an essential nutrient for plants, are most often supplied through fertilizers for agriculture.

Northwestern University researchers are challenging the long-held belief that iron oxides simply trap phosphorus, revealing instead that they actively help convert it into a form plants can use.

Conventional wisdom has long held that iron oxides merely trap phosphorus in the environment. Yet new research has uncovered a more dynamic role for these minerals in driving the conversion of organic ...

Northwestern University researchers are actively overturning the conventional view of iron oxides as mere phosphorus "sinks." A critical nutrient for life, most phosphorus in the soil is organic - ...

Northwestern University researchers are actively overturning the conventional view of iron oxides as mere phosphorus "sinks." A critical nutrient for life, most phosphorus in the soil is organic ...

Most phosphorus in the environment is in an organic form that plants cannot directly use, and traditional understanding suggested only enzymes could convert it into the bioavailable inorganic form.

Plants and microbes are known to secrete enzymes to transform organic phosphorus into bioavailable inorganic phosphorus. Now, researchers report iron oxides can drive the same conversion at ...