S Hemalatha1, S Chellamuthu, and V Ravikumar
An incubation experiment was conducted at Water Technology Centre, Tamil Nadu Agricultural University, Coimbatore during 2011, to study the reaction rate constants of urea under sub-tropical conditions. The different concentration of urea was used with constant moisture and temperature. The values for KHU, (hydrolysis rate constant) observed were 0.014,0.0134, 0.0139, and 0.0140 h-1 for 1.582, 3.71, 37.04, and 55.55 (mg N/cm3), respectively. The KD, (distribution rate coefficient) values observed were 0.0138,0.03465, 0.03386, and 0.0139 h-1 for 1.582, 3.71, 37.04, and 55.55 (mg N/cm3), respectively. KV, volatilization coefficient values observed were 0.0070, 0.0078, , 0.0083 and 0.0071 hr-1 for the urea N concentrations of 1.582, 3.71, 37.04, and 55.55 (mg N/cm3), respectively. And the KN, nitrification rate constant values were 0.0076, 0.0074, 0.0074 and 0.0077 h-1 for 1.582, 3.71, 37.04, and 55.55 (mg N/cm3), of urea doses respectively.