Submitted to: Journal of Nematology
Publication Type: Abstract Only
Publication Acceptance Date: March 1, 1999
Publication Date: N/A
Technical Abstract: Solid carbon dioxide (dry ice) was added to pots containing soil that was infested either with eggs of the root-knot nematode, Meloidogyne incognita, or with tomato (Lycopersicon esculentum) root fragments that were infected with various developmental stages of this nematode. Two hours after the dry ice was added, thermocouples, which were placed at three different levels in the pots, recorded temperatures that ranged from -15 deg C to -59 deg C. Twenty-four hours after the addition of dry ice, the temperature of the soil had equilibrated with that of the greenhouse. At that time, susceptible tomato (cv. Rutgers) seedlings were planted in pots containing the two infested soils that had been treated with the dry ice, as well as in pots with identical soils that had not received the cryogen treatment (controls). After five weeks, the plant roots were removed from the pots and freed from the soil so that nematode eggs could be recovered and counted. The results of the counts indicated that plants that were grown in egg-infested soil that had received the dry ice treatment had less than 1% of the eggs found in the controls, i.e. plants grown in infested soils that had not received the dry ice treatment. Plants growing in soil that was infested with root fragments and had received dry ice treatment had less than 4% of the eggs found in controls. These results indicate that a cryogen such as dry ice may have potential as a cryonematicide for some species of plant parasitic nematodes.