Justus von Liebig was the first to understand the importance of ammonia as fertilizer, and promoted the importance of inorganic minerals to plant nutrition. In England, he attempted to implement his theories commercially through a fertilizer created by treating phosphate of lime in bone meal with sulfuric acid. Another pioneer was John Bennet Lawes who began to experiment on the effects of various manures on plants growing in pots in 1837, leading to a manure formed by treating phosphates with sulphuric acid; this was to be the first product of the nascent artificial manure industry.