ABSTRACT
Phosphate-dissolving microorganisms are widely distributed in soil, rhizosphere and other ecological environment. Understanding the characteristics of these microorganisms in solubilizing phosphates is helpful to apply them in improving P use efficiency. The obtained results indicated that the fungi had much higher capacity to dissolve the rock than the bacteria. Existence of Fe, Al, Mg and Na in the culture media reduced the rock solubilization by the bacteria, but increased the solubilization of the fungi. The higher content of the rock in the media, the lower capacity of the rock phosphate solubilization was found. The capacity was also significantly reduced if the concentration of C material in the media was higher than 3%. It was also found that the microorganisms destroyed the rock structure. The P was more easily released from the rock at further incubation. In conclusion, there is some potential to utilize the microorganisms to activate the rock phosphate.