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Agriculture
Special Issues
Converting and Recycling of Agroforestry Residues
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Converting and Recycling of Agroforestry Residues

A special issue of Agriculture (ISSN 2077-0472). This special issue belongs to the section "Ecosystem, Environment and Climate Change in Agriculture".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 25 August 2025 | Viewed by 624

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Hu Cheng

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
College of Biology and the Environment, Nanjing Forestry University, Nanjing 210037, China
Interests: soil; biowaste; biochar; hydrochar; organic pollutants; dissolved organic matter; solid-phase microextraction
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Dr. He Guo

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
College of Ecology and the Environment, Nanjing Forestry University, Nanjing 210037, China
Interests: advanced oxidation technology; cold plasma-catalysis; ozonation-catalysis; photocatalysis
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Jiangang Han

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
College of Biology and the Environment, Nanjing Forestry University, Nanjing 210037, China
Interests: biochar; biogas residue; fermentation; soil; straw; rice; heavy metals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Faced with hundreds of billions of tons of agroforestry residues produced annually around the world, waste-to-resources is a great biowaste management strategy allowing this biowaste to enter a new lifecycle, helping achieve green and sustainable development in agriculture and forestry. Agroforestry residues can be converted into organic fertilizers and plastics, animal feed, energy, edible mushroom substrates, and chemical raw materials, attracting much attention in the current carbon age. However, the process of converting agroforestry residues into resources presents some challenges such as a low conversion efficiency, high costs, secondary environmental pollution, poor product performance, unclear conversion processes and mechanisms, and difficult precise regulation, which urgently need to be addressed.

This Special Issue focuses on the novel separation and conversion methods, detailed conversion processes and mechanisms, the application of converted products (such as hydrochar, artificial humic acids, biodiesel, and biopesticides), the economic analysis of recycling technologies, and the life cycle assessment of waste-to-resources for agroforestry residues. This issue will include interdisciplinary studies embracing agriculture in the biology, chemistry, and engineering fields. Research articles will cover a broad range of biowaste, such as straw, sawdust, biogas residues, feces, and other biowaste from agriculture and forestry. All types of articles, such as original research, opinions, and reviews are welcome.

Dr. Hu Cheng
Dr. He Guo
Prof. Dr. Jiangang Han
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Agriculture is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • agroforestry residues
  • pyrolysis
  • hydrolysis
  • fermentation
  • carbon sequestration
  • biomass conversion
  • biomaterial
  • cellulose
  • lignin

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

19 pages, 1560 KiB  
Article
Hop Waste Seed Coating (Pilling) as Circular Bioeconomic Alternative to Improve Seed Germination and Trichoderma Development
by Sara Mayo-Prieto, Alejandra J. Porteous-Álvarez, Guzmán Carro-Huerga, Laura Zanfaño, Daniela Ramírez-Lozano, Álvaro Rodríguez-González, Alicia Lorenzana de la Varga and Pedro A. Casquero
Agriculture 2025, 15(13), 1328; https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture15131328 - 20 Jun 2025
Abstract
This study investigates the use of hop cone residues as a sustainable alternative to peat in seed coating formulations for the delivery of biocontrol agents such as Trichoderma. Some native isolates, T. velutinum T029 and T. harzianum T019 and T059, were tested [...] Read more.
This study investigates the use of hop cone residues as a sustainable alternative to peat in seed coating formulations for the delivery of biocontrol agents such as Trichoderma. Some native isolates, T. velutinum T029 and T. harzianum T019 and T059, were tested for their development on peat and hop residues using qPCR. The results showed significantly higher fungal growth in hop cones, indicating their value as a carbon-rich substrate. Seed germination tests on various species showed that hop-based coatings did not inhibit germination and in some cases improved it. Field trials confirmed that bean seeds coated with hops 24 h before sowing outperformed those coated with peat, particularly in integrated production systems, in terms of germination. The results of this study suggest a new area of research: using hop residues in sustainable seed treatments could promote the valorization of agricultural residues, while improving crop establishment and reducing the dependence on synthetic inputs. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Converting and Recycling of Agroforestry Residues)
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15 pages, 2769 KiB  
Article
Converting Agroforestry Biowaste into Stable Near-Natural Chars via Hydrothermal Humification and Pyrolysis for Immobilizing Plasticizer
by Tao Xue, Yi Li, Zimo Chen, Chao Kong, Biyun Feng, Changyin Zhu, Yinlong Zhang, Jianming Xue and Hu Cheng
Agriculture 2025, 15(11), 1177; https://doi.org/10.3390/agriculture15111177 - 29 May 2025
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Abstract
To ensure agricultural safety and ecological security, it is crucial to effectively immobilize emerging organic pollutants, such as plasticizers, to prevent their migration in various environmental matrices. However, the ideal immobilization agent with the advantages of being environmentally friendly is very rare. In [...] Read more.
To ensure agricultural safety and ecological security, it is crucial to effectively immobilize emerging organic pollutants, such as plasticizers, to prevent their migration in various environmental matrices. However, the ideal immobilization agent with the advantages of being environmentally friendly is very rare. In this study, low-cost and stable near-natural immobilization agents, char-derived artificial humic acids, CHAs, were proposed and prepared via hydrothermal humification (180 °C) and pyrolysis (300, 500, or 700 °C) of agroforestry biowaste. The resulting CHAs exhibit high purity (composed primarily of C (67.28–81.35%), O (6.65–21.64%), H (1.40–5.28%), and N (0.36–0.58%)) with remarkably low ash content (5.43–10.02%). Characterization revealed a compact structure with a limited porosity with small surface area (0.27–0.32 m2 g−1) and pore volume (2.99–3.43 × 10−4 cm3 g−1). Notably, high-temperature pyrolysis induced consumption of oxygen-containing functional groups while promoting aromatic structure formation. The sorption behavior of diethyl phthalate, a representative plasticizer, on CHAs was well described by both Langmuir isotherm and pseudo-second-order kinetic models. The CHAs exhibited remarkable sorption performance for diethyl phthalate, with a maximum sorption capacity reaching 3345 mg kg−1 as determined by the Langmuir model. The sorption of diethyl phthalate onto CHAs is mainly multi-layer sorption dominated by physical processes, mainly including pore filling, partitioning, hydrogen bonding, and π–π stacking. Mean sorption energies ranging from 2.56 to 4.99 × 10−3 kJ mol−1 indicate the predominance of physical sorption mechanisms. This study developed a method to convert the liquid by-product produced during hydrothermal humification of biowaste into stable near-natural and carbon-rich char materials, and the proposed materials show great promise in immobilizing pollutants from various environmental matrices. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Converting and Recycling of Agroforestry Residues)
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