Electrophoresis and size-exclusion chromatography of humic substances extracted from detritus and soils of different geneses

Electrophoresis in 10% polyacrylamide gel in the presence of denaturants and size-exclusion chromatography in Sephadex G-75 in 7 M urea were used for the comparative analysis of humic substances isolated from a typical chernozem, soddy-podzolic soil, and chestnut soil and from the easily decomposable organic matter (plant detritus) contained in these soils. After the electrophoresis, the gel with naturally colored bands of humic substances was further stained with a dye specific for proteins by immersing into a solution containing Coomassie Brilliant Blue R-250 and CuSO4. The electrophoretic and chromatographic analyses showed that humic substances from the soils and the corresponding detritus fractions significantly differed in the intensity of the natural color of the electrophoretic fractions, the molecular-weight distribution, and the color of the electrophoretic fractions colored by the protein-specific dye (which was first discovered in this study). The hypothesis of Tyurin and Aleksandrova suggesting that the transformation of humus sources (plant detritus) into humic substances proceeds in the direction from the high-molecular compounds to the low-molecular compounds was experimentally confirmed.