Cornell University Study Shows Glyphosate Damages Soil-Friendly Bacteria

Published: October 7, 2017

As farmers battle in their above-ground war on weeds using glyphosate-based herbicides, they may inadvertently create underground casualties – unintentionally attacking the beneficial bacteria that help crops guard against enemy fungus.

“Beneficial Pseudomonas in the soil can help crops thrive. They can produce plant-stimulating hormones to promote plant growth and antifungals to defeat problematic fungi – such as Pythium and Fusarium – found in agricultural soil, but previous studies reported that the abundance of beneficial bacteria decreased when the herbicide glyphosate seeps underground,” said Ludmilla Aristilde, assistant professor of biological and environmental engineering. “Our study seeks to understand why this happens.”

Soil bacteria require their proteins – composed of amino acids – and their metabolism to support cellular growth and the production of important metabolites to sustain their underground fight. But glyphosate applied to crops can drain into the soil and disrupt the molecular factories in the bacterial cells in some species, interfering with their metabolic and amino acid machinery.

The new findings show that glyphosate does not target the amino acid production and metabolic gadgetry equally among the Pseudomonas species. For example, when Pseudomonas protegens, a bacteria used as a biocontrol agent for cereal crops, and Pseudomonas fluorescens, used as a fungus biocontrol for fruit trees, were exposed to varying glyphosate concentrations, the researchers noted no ill effects. However, in two species of Pseudomonas putida, used in soil fungus control for corn and other crops, the bacteria had notably stunted growth, said Aristilde, who is a faculty fellow at Cornell’s Atkinson Center for a Sustainable Future.

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