Metabolt: An In-Situ Instrument to Characterize the Metabolic Activity of Microbial Soil Ecosystems Using Electrochemical and Gaseous Signatures.

ABSTRACT: Metabolt is a portable soil incubator to characterize the metabolic activity of microbial ecosystems in soils. It measures the electrical conductivity, the redox potential, and the concentration of certain metabolism-related gases in the headspace just above a given sample of regolith. In its current design, the overall weight of Metabolt, including the soils (250 g), is 1.9 kg with a maximum power consumption of 1.5 W. Metabolt has been designed to monitor the activity of the soil microbiome for Earth and space applications. In particular, it can be used to monitor the health of soils, the atmospheric-regolith fixation, and release of gaseous species such as N2, H2O, CO2, O2, N2O, NH3, etc., that affect the Earth climate and atmospheric chemistry. It may be used to detect and monitor life

SUBMITTER: Nazarious MI 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7472036 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature