Editorial: Plant-soil-microbe interactions and drivers in ecosystem development and ecological restoration

Abstract

Studies on the ecological restoration or rehabilitation of deeply disturbed and degraded ecosystems, and reintegration of fragmented, dysfunctional landscapes around the world report failures or unsatisfactory outcomes. These failures are increasingly attributed to inadequate consideration of substrate and its implications for plant and microbial establishment and survival (Mendes et al., 2019). Much greater knowledge of soil processes and interactions is needed if we are to develop techniques and technology that will help us come reasonably close to achieving global restoration aspirations (Cross et al. 2019;Aronson et al., 2020).Better consideration of soil biota, and other critical edaphic factors, is clearly needed to ameliorate and revitalize substrate conditions and plant-soil interactions so as to sustainably restore and support indigenous microbial, invertebrate and vertebrate fauna, and vegetation communities, ecosystems and landscapes (Cross and Lambers, 2017;Cross et al., 2021a;Cross et al., 2021b). It has been proposed that, at least in some regions, soil characteristics and their changes through time likely represent among the strongest drivers, filters and leverages for species establishment, ecological succession and recovery, and overall effectiveness in ecological restoration and rehabilitation (ERR) projects (Bauer et al., 2015;.The processes influencing pedogenesis and nutrient cycles in soils also impact the establishment and succession plant species and assemblages through time (Eger et al., 2011;Lambers et al., 2011;Lalibertéet al., 2013). They are also dynamic and influenced in their turn by complex plant-soil, plant-microbe, and microbe-soil interactions (Lambers et al., 2008;van Schöll et al., 2008;Shanmugam and Kingery, 2018). Recent studies have identified substrate conditions limiting, or totally blocking ERR efforts. These include, but are not limited to, highly altered materials presenting ecologically hostile chemical Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution frontiersin.org 01