r/Damnthatsinteresting • u/Kaos2018 • 3h ago

Image A Brazilian Scientist Mariangelina Hungria spent 40years developing bacteria that supply crops from nitrogen from the air. A $2 solution replaces fertilisers and cuts 230 million tons of CO2 emissions, granting her “World Food Prize” award

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6.6k Upvotes

98% Upvoted

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556

u/Kescay 3h ago

https://www.worldfoodprize.org/en/laureates/20202026_laureates/2025_hungria/

"Today, this technology is used annually on 85 percent of Brazil’s total cultivated area of soybeans, more than 30 million hectares—the highest inoculation adoption rate in the world.

In addition to having a beneficial environmental effect, this has significantly reduced farmers’ costs. Farmers may use 30-50 kilograms of synthetic fertilizer per hectare at a cost of about US$1 per kilogram. By contrast, farmers spend as little as US$2-3 per hectare on the bacteria inoculant, which can supply the complete nitrogen needs of the crop."

90

u/DiamondAvailable7418 2h ago

I have a suspicion, if this bacteria can have self sustaining population soon they are going to be all around the world, is higher nitrogen content in soil good for whole planet soil? Seems dangerous...

143

u/Nunc27 2h ago

Nitrogen fixing bacteria occur naturally. She just selected high performance strains.

-114

u/DiamondAvailable7418 2h ago

And it took 40 years? And she was first at selecting them? Seems wrong, but i am not saying that this is false

51

u/Agricola20 1h ago

Based on limited reading, it looks like she selected strains to work optimally in Brazil’s tropical climate specifically. Agronomists in North America and Europe had been working for several decades to research and pick out optimal nitrogen-fixing strains for their own climates, but had more-or-less ignored the global south.

6

u/Facts_pls 48m ago

A famous example of nitrogen fixing bacteria is found in root nodules of certain plants like beans. The nodules there provide an environment suitable for the bacteria (free from oxygen or something).

Maybe this was around finding bacteria that can live naturally or something?

134

u/Toronto_bunnies 2h ago

It's probably much better than the current synthetic fertilizer runoffs creating dead zones and algal blooms

-22

u/DiamondAvailable7418 2h ago

? 1. If it work like normal fertilizer you also are going to have runoff 2. Runoff would not be only from fields but fromm all land.

40

u/GreenStrong 2h ago
  1. If it work like normal fertilizer you also are going to have runoff 2

Not really. Fertilizer is applies at the beginning of the season to bare soil, and possibly an additional application at mid season. Soil has a certain amount of cation exchange capacity, but rain can wash a lot of it into rivers. Nitrogen fixing crops produce fertilizer literally inside of roots, there is basically zero runoff while the plant is alive. Eventually, the plant's life ends. In the case of soybeans, the much of the nitrogen becomes protein in the beans, but some is left as protein in the leaves and roots. This is much less mobile than applying nitrate salts to soil. The protein becomes bacterial and fungal biomass, which is eventually eaten by nematodes and earthworms. Every level of the food chain secretes some waste, in the form of ammonia or urea, but this is a slow process distributed through the soil, not dumping tons of fertilizer salts on the surface in an hour.

2

u/angaraki 59m ago

Thanks for the explanation 🫰

-2

u/cantrip_1 2h ago

and the runoff IS WHAT MAKES THE FERTILIZED soil - meaning it won't just stop when it's runoff, it'll keep.making.more

17

u/grey_fr 1h ago

Soy beans are part or the fabaceae family like beans and peas. They are usually said to enrich the soil with nitrogen (the main element plants need for growth) from the air but it is not exactly true: plant can only get nitrogen as a solid/mineral from the soil and not from the air. However, fabaceae grow with a special kind of bacteria attached to their roots that CAN get nitrogen from the air and "give" it to the plant in an exchange for sugars (from photosynthesis). Nitrogen also remains in the soil when those bacteria die, available for the next crop, so I guess she worked on those.

6

u/I_Am_Become_Salt 1h ago

Already exists. Beans and plants in the pea family already use a symbiotic relationship with a bacteria in their roots to do exactly this.

3

u/Facts_pls 47m ago

Bro. I see you complaining about this in so many spots with completely made up theories. It is clear that you didn't even bother to read.

Are you a fertilizer producer or something?

3

u/Ebashbulbash 1h ago

We've been using biofertilizers for a long time and with great success. Even my mother-in-law uses these nitrogen-fixing bacteria in her garden. Besides nitrogen fixers, we also use phosphate-mobilizing bacteria, bacteria that produce phytohormones (auxins), bacteria and fungi with antifungal properties, and fungi with insecticidal properties. In many countries, this is an affordable and safe way to increase yields.

Nitrogen-fixing symbiotic bacteria in soybean roots have been known for a very long time; for thousands of years, people have been planting grain crops after legumes to increase yields.

Beyond horticulture, biopreparations are used in medicine. Various bacteria and even viruses are used to treat human diseases.

2

u/sobatfestival 1h ago

Most informed American:

2

u/RW-Firerider 59m ago

I mean, we have 78% Nitrogen in the air, i doubt that they can bind enough to create problems

-2

u/420_69_Fake_Account 2h ago

Great for greenhouses

1

u/Several_Vanilla8916 2h ago

Would you say there’s a positive greenhouse effect?

8

u/joedhoe 2h ago

Who is Hector and why is he getting all this money?

2

u/toothpicks-galore 31m ago

more importantly how many is a brazilian, i dont know know if that is a lot or a little, but it sounds like its good news

86

u/Kaos2018 3h ago

Source : https://www.worldfoodprize.org/documents/filelibrary/2025_Laureate_Brochure__FINAL_7E7F48F8F1D39.pdf

3

u/charlu 3h ago

The Requested Page Is Unavailable

31

u/PsyOpBunnyHop 3h ago

This is the actual URL.

https://www.worldfoodprize.org/documents/filelibrary/2025_Laureate_Brochure__FINAL_7E7F48F8F1D39.pdf

The reddit app butchers it because the reddit app can't handle the underscores.

Reddit admins don't care how that affects web users.

3

u/bartleby_bartender 3h ago

It loads fine for me.

92

u/SassiesSoiledPanties 3h ago

This is double plus good. Using fertilizers is a triple-whammy of environmental damage. Most have to be synthesized from petro-chemicals; using them causes damage to the soil and the runoff causes algal blooms.

10

u/abunnywithnoname 3h ago

Haha, double plus good. I just heard the history behind his yesterday and now I'm actually seeing it being used... weird. I kind of want to start saying it now.

6

u/gimmelwald 3h ago

Double plus ungood has been my go to for some time, thanks bobiverse!

3

u/abunnywithnoname 2h ago

Does that mean... "It's been hell," or something similar?

14

u/gimmelwald 2h ago

It's actuallly a "newspeak" phrase from Orwelll's 1984 that essentially means extremely terrible, or the absolute worst something or a situation can be. 

6

u/urbanmember 2h ago

What gimmelwald said.

If you haven't, please buy and read the book. It's not very long, its easy to understand and has depth to it that it will make you realize stuff about it years later without reading it.

Don't just go into it thinking its just about 'communism bad!'

3

u/raf_boy 2h ago

Been saying this for 40 years. Ever since I had to read 1984 in English class.

2

u/Oiiack 2h ago

If things are double plus ungood, you can rely on Butterworth to have a cow.

1

u/Mnm0602 26m ago

“We’ve always been at war with Eastasia.”

143

u/xShadezx 3h ago

They will try to bully her into selling the patent.

38

u/AdvancedSandwiches 2h ago

Hey, cliché conspiracy guy. This has been in massive use for a long time. 40 million hectares of farms by 2020.

-3

u/xShadezx 42m ago

That is good to hear, but pointing out comon things that happen, when somebody invents something wich leads to less earnings in a other field is not something that should trigger a "Hey, cliché conspiracy guy".

Weird response, but as i said good to hear.

11

u/Twicebakedpotatoe 2h ago

And then make it prohibitively expensive à la insulin

13

u/Set_Abominae1776 1h ago

Insulin is only expensive if you have an orange baboon as head of state.

2

u/khalinexus 1h ago

The Americans are going to be pissed off because they csnt sell it... It is public domain

43

u/Fantastic_Grass1799 3h ago

Damnit. Fertilizer companies hate this woman... all thanks to this one simple $2 trick.

29

u/Donday90 3h ago

Nice. Please help me understand how big this is? Isn't this revolutionary?

27

u/HD_Thoreau_aweigh 3h ago

I'm having a hard time figuring that out as well. It seems like this is widely used but only within brazil, and I can't tell if it's a full substitute for nitrogen traditionally produced by the haber Bosch process, or if it is only a partial substitute or even a compliment.

5

u/MrShake4 1h ago

The text in the award summary specifically calls out “tropical agriculture”

There’s probably something about the environment of Brazil or the specific areas of Brazil that makes this method effective.

I.e it’s not coming to the Canadian prairies anytime soon

3

u/New-Perspective6209 12m ago

It's innoculant you put in when planting nitrogen affixing plants like cover crop legumes to help them be more efficient, it's been around for a while now and is a pretty common practice worldwide these days, not sure why it's being treated as revolutionary unless she's come up with a super version, but pretty sure it would mention that.

No, it can't replace traditional fert but it can help reduce it. By a bit.

8

u/SentientYoghurt 2h ago

Same thought. If true, this is revolutionary. Why am I reading about it now for the first time?

2

u/Ebashbulbash 1h ago

Organic (bio) fertilizers are used successfully in many countries around the world; in many countries, fungal and bacterial-based products can even be used in your own garden. You've probably heard of Trichoderma, Bacillus subtilis, and others. Nitrogen-fixing bacteria (Azotobacter, Azospirillum, and others) have also been on the market for a long time.

2

u/grey_fr 15m ago

Plants from the bean family "fixing" nitrogen in the soil thanks to symbiotic bacteria is a natural and well-known phenomenon. She researched it and probably made it possible to control and optimize it

-13

u/DiamondAvailable7418 2h ago

I have a suspicion, if this bacteria can have self sustaining population soon they are going to be all around the world, is higher nitrogen content in soil good for whole planet soil? Seems dangerous...

6

u/Illustrious_Sir4041 2h ago

From what i got its a commonly occuring bacterium they use - the trick is adding it directöy to the beans when planting.

So there is minimal risk

5

u/Gravitas-and-Urbane 2h ago

Well it must work if there's bots being deployed to convince us it's too dangerous.

-4

u/DiamondAvailable7418 2h ago

Do you think that i am bot? Xd

9

u/sootbrownies 1h ago

"bacteria that supply crops from nitrogen from the air", the term you're looking for is nitrogen fixing bacteria. Sorry to nitpick, but as a bio major that sentence gave me cancer.

26

u/myrthain 3h ago

Source?

83

u/Initial_Ad_9857 3h ago

From air

13

u/HeartOn_SoulAceUp 3h ago

Free, for now.

3

u/Initial_Ad_9857 3h ago

You must be on the run cowboy

2

u/whudaboutit 2h ago

Yeah, how can we tax the air? That's not rhetorical. I want 3 proposals on my desk by close of business or you're fired.

3

u/Initial_Ad_9857 2h ago

how air was taxed in cipollino In Gianni Rodari's 1951 children's book  The tax on air is introduced by the tyrannical Prince Lemon and his pompous steward, Signor Tomato, as a desperate measure to increase state revenues.  The system operates under absurd authoritarian logic: The Complaint of Under-Breathing: In a famous satirical twist, Prince Lemon complains that after the air tax was introduced, the citizens started breathing less to save money, causing state incomes to decrease. He calls this passive resistance "outrageous".  Escalation to Weather Taxes: Because the citizens manage to reduce their air consumption, the rulers decide to expand the tax brackets to all forms of weather and atmospheric phenomena. They introduce a flat decree forcing people to pay for sunshine, wind, and precipitation.  Precipitation Tiered Pricing: In the animated short, the weather tax is split into strict tiers: Ordinary rain: 100 lire Torrential rain: 200 lire Storms with thunder and lightning: 300 lire  This extreme, literal monetization of the elements is what finally pushes Cipollino (the Little Onion) and his fellow fruit and vegetable townspeople to revolt against the monarchy and reclaim their basic right to nature. 

2

u/Pin_ny 2h ago

Boss, I propose :

  • a tax on the body weight

  • a tax for people living in flat or house without trees

  • a tax on the plane tickets because planes go vroooom through the air

8

u/Saint_of_Stinkers 2h ago

This makes nitrogen much cheaper and is a game changer, much better than making it the way we do it now. The real prize is going to be when someone figures out how to make potash instead of us still having to dig it out of the ground.

3

u/vocally_fried_brain 2h ago

hungria? curious

4

u/Interesting_Bunch323 3h ago

I’m going to miss Ms. Hungria

5

u/One_Above_You 1h ago

And she deserves nothing less than a Nobel for this.

Fritz Haber got a Nobel for almost the same thing of discovering a process(Haber's process) to massively generate Ammonia and got Nobel 1918 so does she deserve

2

u/Old_Shake3789 2h ago

Doesn't this only work on some crops and is only recommended as a supplement for now?

2

u/Pleasant-Future5818 2h ago

Also what's with all these weird bot ass comments implying someone is going to murder this woman? Are y'all of the impression there's some cabal trying to keep grains expensive because I assure you the conspiracy runs the opposite direction

4

u/aimfuldrifter 2h ago

Poor woman. It was nice knowing her.

3

u/mr_kangaroo 3h ago

So sad to hear about her upcoming suicide 

2

u/Fair_Independence_91 2h ago

She worked hard so that no one would go hungria

3

u/racao_premium 3h ago

Jornais brasileiros:

Veja por que isso é ruim para a economia.

3

u/I_might_be_weasel 3h ago

Her next project: Super mustard gas.

3

u/IndiscriminateWaster 3h ago

She has single-handedly saved Brazil’s war effort.

1

u/FahkDizchit 3h ago

Hopefully, she doesn’t get into pesticides.

1

u/Zharknd 18m ago

40 años

•

u/jdub67a 4m ago

This is the start of plants taking over the world.

All hail our plant overlords!

1

u/moosechowder 2h ago

Never coming to US, is it?

1

u/dannypepperplant 1h ago

Meanwhile: Lake of America

0

u/Glittering_Swing_151 3h ago

3rd time reposted today along with the Mars images that’s been reposted like 10 times. Damn Reddit is dead.

0

u/Impossible_Fig3072 3h ago

Good god don't fly anywhere with her.

-1

u/RedSix2447 3h ago

Diaper Don is going to be mad about this. He will find a way to take it from her watch.

0

u/druidmind 3h ago

Bayer is coming for her!

0

u/be_sugary 2h ago

When will this be available?

0

u/GodlyCash 2h ago

Wow, amazing. I'm going to watch the price of our food increase anyways.

0

u/Chemical-Chard-8798 2h ago

Is that Flo's (from Progressive) mom?!?

0

u/Pleasant-Future5818 2h ago

Nominative determinism

0

u/architecTiger 2h ago

Why is this bacteria not used all around the world?

0

u/NiceDreamsCWB 52m ago

😉🇧🇷

0

u/nite31 19m ago

I had an aneurysm trying to read the title with two "from"s

-1

u/TyrusX 1h ago

Not to take from Brazil’s accomplishment but does this ladies surname implies that she is of Hungarian descent? Couldn’t confirm but her surname seem to imply that

-1

u/brazucadomundo 1h ago

Soon she will be accused of developing nukes and Brazil will be occupied by a certain country.

-6

u/Laugh-Aggressive 1h ago

Took her sweet time, didn't she, thank god she don't work on Rockstar...