Nitrogen fertilizers play an essential role in ensuring global food security. However, the applied fertilizer-nitrogen, particularly that exceeding crop demand and soil N retention capacity, can potentially escape into the ...
Ecology
Apr 16, 2024
0
1
Researchers led by Satoshi Kamiguchi at the RIKEN Center for Sustainable Resource Science (CSRS) in Japan have discovered a greener way to produce ammonia, an essential compound used in fertilizers.
Analytical Chemistry
Apr 15, 2024
0
151
Ring-shaped chemical structures called saturated heterocycles are found in most FDA-approved drugs but are often difficult to create. Scripps Research chemists have just developed a surprisingly easy method for making many ...
Materials Science
Apr 13, 2024
0
85
Assessing the function of forest ecosystems requires a deep understanding of the mechanisms of soil nitrogen mineralization. A study conducted by a team of researchers has shed light on how soil N-cycling genes drive soil ...
Ecology
Apr 12, 2024
0
9
Insect pheromones are odor molecules used for chemical communication within a species. Sex pheromones play a crucial role in the mating of many insects. Species-specific odors attract males and females of the same species. ...
Ecology
Apr 11, 2024
0
2
Sunlight has a major influence on chemical processes. Its high-energy UV radiation in particular is strongly absorbed by all materials and triggers photochemical reactions of the substances present in the air. A well-known ...
Optics & Photonics
Apr 10, 2024
0
31
Nitrogen is a nutrient essential for all life on Earth. Although nitrogen gas (N2) is plentiful, it is largely unavailable to most organisms without a process known as nitrogen fixation, which converts dinitrogen to ammonium—a ...
Evolution
Apr 3, 2024
0
319
Among the many chemicals we use every day, ammonia is one of the worst for the atmosphere. The nitrogen-based chemical used in fertilizer, dyes, explosives and many other products ranks second only to cement in terms of carbon ...
Analytical Chemistry
Apr 1, 2024
0
198
Coral reefs are some of the oldest, most diverse ecosystems on Earth, and among the most valuable. They nurture 25% of all ocean life, protect coasts from storms and add billions of dollars yearly to the global economy through ...
Ecology
Mar 31, 2024
0
11
Elevated surface ozone concentrations in China are posing a significant threat to both human health and crop yields. Extreme heat can greatly exacerbate ozone pollution through both complex chemical and physical processes. ...
Earth Sciences
Mar 27, 2024
0
19
Nitrogen (pronounced /ˈnaɪtrədʒɨn/) is a chemical element that has the symbol N and atomic number 7 and atomic mass 14.00674 u. Elemental nitrogen is a colorless, odorless, tasteless and mostly inert diatomic gas at standard conditions, constituting 78% by volume of Earth's atmosphere.
Many industrially important compounds, such as ammonia, nitric acid, organic nitrates (propellants and explosives), and cyanides, contain nitrogen. The extremely strong bond in elemental nitrogen dominates nitrogen chemistry, causing difficulty for both organisms and industry in converting the N2 into useful compounds, and releasing large amounts of energy when these compounds burn or decay back into nitrogen gas.
The element nitrogen was discovered by Daniel Rutherford, a Scottish physician, in 1772. Nitrogen occurs in all living organisms. It is a constituent element of amino acids and thus of proteins, and of nucleic acids (DNA and RNA). It resides in the chemical structure of almost all neurotransmitters, and is a defining component of alkaloids, biological molecules produced by many organisms.
This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA
