Synthetic crop fertilizers are used to provide crops the nitrogen to ensure their survival. But this fertilizers are also known are as a huge source of pollution. These fertilizers are dangerous because they usually get washed away from fields to enter waterways.

Thanks to a scientist at the University of Nottingham who has come up with an environmentally-friendly process to allow plants to obtain naturally-occurring nitrogen directly from the atmosphere.

Presently, there are only a few types of plants that are able to grasp nitrogen from air. A symbiotic nitrogen-fixing bacteria enables them to do so. Most of the other plants rely on the soil to get nitrogen. However, when a lot of plants grow close together, the nitrogen content has to be increased with fertilizer.

Cocking has developed a process that is known as N-fix. It uses a non-toxic covering to coat seeds that have the bacterium. The bacterium enters through roots and ends up in every cell of the plant.

Lab and field tests have been conducted on N-Fix for past 10 years.

Coking said, "The world needs to unhook itself from its ever increasing reliance on synthetic nitrogen fertilizers produced from fossil fuels with its high economic costs, its pollution of the environment and its high energy costs".