Characterization of Soil Microbial Biomass Carbon and Nitrogen in Four Forest Types of Shushan Urban Forest Park

Abstract

This study aimed to investigate the role of plantation forests and natural secondary forests in controlling soil physicochemical properties and microbial biomass in urban forest ecosystems. (1) Background: Urban forests provide numerous benefits to urban ecosystems, but the interaction between forest stands and soil properties in controlling soil microbial biomass carbon (MBC) and nitrogen (MBN) remains poorly understood. The objective of this study was to examine how different forest types (plantation forests and natural secondary forests) influence soil physicochemical properties and microbial biomass in urban forest ecosystems. (2) Methods: We conducted a study in Shushan Urban Forest Park, Hefei, China, utilizing redundancy analysis and linear regression analyses to identify key environmental factors affecting the microbial distribution and significant correlations between soil properties and microbial biomass. (3) Results: Plantation forests generally had lower pH, water content, and organic carbon and nutrient content than natural forests. Natural forests exhibited higher microbial biomass and nutrient cycling capacity. Soil depth and forest type have significant effects on soil properties and microbial biomass in both growing and dormant seasons, with practical implications for forest management and soil conservation in similar ecosystems. Soil water content (SWC), pH, total nitrogen (TN), total phosphorus (TP), and soil organic carbon (SOC) were identified as key factors affecting microbial carbon and nitrogen distribution during both growing and dormant seasons. Our study provides important insights into the role of forest stands and soil physicochemical properties in controlling soil microbial biomass in urban forest ecosystems. Effective forest management strategies should be developed to promote sustainable and resilient forest ecosystems. Future research should investigate the underlying mechanisms driving these relationships and focus on promoting sustainable and resilient urban forest ecosystems.

Methodological Approaches and Literature Analysis in the Study of Soil Carbon in Urban Green Spaces: A Systematic Review

“…Their soil carbon data provide carbon information, despite being the central theme of the research. For example, studies that focused on soil properties [22,29,[62][63][64][65][66][67][68][69][70][71][72][73][74], ecosystem services [2,19,31,43,[75][76][77][78] or aspects such as urban sprawl and land use change [26,77,79,80].…”

“…As mentioned in the introduction, a predominant focus on soil carbon has been studied in the form of SOC [1,2,4,[16][17][18][19]21,22,[26][27][28][29]43,45,[48][49][50][51][52][54][55][56][57][58][59][60][61][62]65,67,[69][70][71][72]74,76,[80][81][82][83] and in the form of Total Carbon [25,50,51,63,65,66,68,73,75,[77]…”

“…In terms of the methodology, there majority of the articles reported in situ sampling in soils of urban green areas. Many of these studies were based solely on in situ measurements [1,2,16,18,21,22,29,43,49,[52][53][54]56,[58][59][60][61][62][63][64][65][66][67][68][70][71][72][73][74][75][76]78,80,81,83,85]. Some researchers complement this approach with other methods such as remote sensing imagery [4,26,27,57], open data [26,28,45,79,84], logarithmic modelling [17,31,48,50,…”

“…In the analyses carried out using in situ measurements, a discrepancy was found in the criteria used for soil sampling depth. While the prevailing trend was to focus on the upper 0-20 or 0-30 cm soil depth [1,4,18,27,28,31,49,54,[56][57][58][59]62,63,65,69,71,72,75,82,83], there were also studies that consider the superficial soil layers, specifically 0-5 cm [21,76], or 0-10 cm [22,29,43,53,64,68,70,85]. Furthermore, some studies even considered in situ sampling at soil depths greater than 50 cm [2,16,17,25,26,45,48,50,52,60,67,74,[78][79][80]84].…”

Effect of forest planting patterns on the formation of soil organic carbon during litter lignocellulose degradation from a microbial perspective

“…Urban forests can provide many ecosystem services, such as improving air quality, sustaining biodiversity, and increasing C fixation (Roeland et al, 2019 ; Xu et al, 2021 ). In addition, urban forests also affect organic carbon components and then maintain ecosystem stability and mitigate climate change, thereby improving urban living quality and environments (Wang et al, 2023 ). Different urban forest planting patterns have different dominant plant species and compositions, resulting in variations in the substrate composition and quality of litter, soil properties, and microbial communities (Xu et al, 2021 ).…”