Soil pH is the primary factor driving the distribution and function of microorganisms in farmland soils in northeastern China

Abstract

Purpose To understand which environmental factors influence the distribution and ecological functions of bacteria in agricultural soil. Method A broad range of farmland soils was sampled from 206 locations in Jilin province, China. We used 16S rRNA genebased Illumina HiSeq sequencing to estimated soil bacterial community structure and functions. Result The dominant taxa in terms of abundance were found to be, Actinobacteria, Acidobacteria, Gemmatimonadetes, Chloroflexi, and Proteobacteria. Bacterial communities were dominantly affected by soil pH, whereas soil organic carbon did not have a significant influence on bacterial communities. Soil pH was significantly positively correlated with bacterial operational taxonomic unit abundance and soil bacterial α-diversity (P<0.05) spatially rather than with soil nutrients. Bacterial functions were estimated using FAPROTAX, and the relative abundance of anaerobic and aerobic chemoheterotrophs, and nitrifying bacteria was 27.66%, 26.14%, and 6.87%, respectively, of the total bacterial community. Generally, the results indicate that soil pH is more important than nutrients in shaping bacterial communities in agricultural soils, including their ecological functions and biogeographic distribution.

The Aromatic Plant Clary Sage Shaped Bacterial Communities in the Roots and in the Trace Element-Contaminated Soil More Than Mycorrhizal Inoculation – A Two-Year Monitoring Field Trial

“…Diversity indexes obtained in the present study are similar or higher in comparison with previous reports on revegetated or agricultural TE-contaminated soils (Foulon et al, 2016a;Xie et al, 2016;Tipayno et al, 2018). However, the comparison of alpha diversity between experimental sites is tricky, as it highly depends on cultivation practices amongst several parameters (soil type and physico-chemical properties, climatic conditions and plant species) (Wang X. et al, 2018, Wang et al, 2019.…”

“…However, variations were observed between our results and previously published studies, in terms of relative abundances between the most represented phyla. One should keep in mind that changes observed between TE-contaminated sites are highly related to several factors, including the climatic conditions, the TE-contamination level, the cultivation practices as well as the soil physico-chemical characteristics, especially pH variations (Wang et al, 2019). As such, Acidobacteria and Proteobacteria have been demonstrated to decrease with increasing pH (Wang et al, 2019).…”

“…One should keep in mind that changes observed between TE-contaminated sites are highly related to several factors, including the climatic conditions, the TE-contamination level, the cultivation practices as well as the soil physico-chemical characteristics, especially pH variations (Wang et al, 2019). As such, Acidobacteria and Proteobacteria have been demonstrated to decrease with increasing pH (Wang et al, 2019). In the present study, however, the soil pH was stable overtime under the different experimental conditions and was relatively high in comparison with acidic mine tailings (Navarro-Noya et al, 2010;Pereira et al, 2015).…”

“…This could be responsible for the relatively low abundance of Acidobacteria and Proteobacteria observed in our conditions. As soil microbial community structure is driven by dominant sources of bioavailable C, plant species is then another determinant factor (Köberl et al, 2013;Monokrousos et al, 2019;Wang et al, 2019). In particular, plants are able to secrete specific root exudates and to modulate their nature (sugars, sterols, amino and organic acids), hence shaping the microbial communities' structure accordingly in the rhizosphere (Wang X. et al, 2018;Misra et al, 2019).…”

Dynamic Changes in the Rhizosphere Bacterial Community in Monoculture and Intercropped Corn and Soybean During Various Crop Growth Stages

“…1). Previous studies showed that pH and organic matter were both important factors affecting crop growth and soil microorganisms (Jung et al, 2008;Wang et al, 2019). In our study, the mantel results also indicated that pH and organic matter were the key factors affecting crop rhizosphere soil microorganisms (Mantel, P < 0.05).…”