Abstract
Biological soil crusts (BSCs) are important for restoring vegetation and improving soil fertility in arid or semiarid desertified land. However, studies on the contribution of BSC microbes to phosphorus (P) transformation remains limited. The microbial diversity involved in P transformation and its dynamic along BSC development should be examined to further understand the microbial regulatory mechanism of the P-cycling process. This paper investigates the soil properties, P fractions, and potential of P transformation across a chronosequence (0-, 8-, 20-, and 35-year) of the BSC under Caragana microphylla plantation on the moving sand dunes in Horqin Grassland, China. An abundance of phoD and gcd genes was detected, and the diversities and structures of phoD- and gcd-haboring microbial communities were illustrated via high-throughput sequencing. Soil nutrient content, activity of alkaline phosphomonoesterase, potential of organic P (OP) mineralization, and the abundance of phoD and gcd genes all linearly increased along with BSC age. The microbial quantity and species diversity of the phoD community were greater than those of gcd. BSC development increased the availability of inorganic P (IP) fractions, and both NaHCO3-Pi and NaOH-Pi were positively correlated with the abundance of the two genes and the activity of alkaline phosphomonoesterase. The phyla of Actinobacteria, Planctomycetes, and Proteobacteria and the family of Streptomycetaceae were the most dominant taxa in the phoD community, Proteobacteria was the dominant phylum in the gcd community in BSC soils, and Rhizobium and Planctomyces were the most dominant genera. The dominant taxa quantitatively responded to soil property improvement, but the basic compositions and dominant taxa did not change along with BSC development. The structures of phoD and gcd communities were linked to soil properties, and pH available K, and total K tend to be the direct determining factors.
Highlights
Revegetation via planting indigenous vascular plants on moving or semi-moving sand dunes has been widely adopted as an effective measure for controlling desertification
The activities of soil Alkaline phosphatase (ALP) were 54.03–131.08 times larger, respectively. These results suggest that Biological soil crusts (BSCs) formation has a more significant improvement effect on soil ALP activity than on soil nutrients
Soil nutrient content (SOM, total nitrogen (TN), NH4-N, available P (AP), and available K (AK)) and ALP activity gradually improved across the development of soil BSC under revegetated plantation on moving sand dunes
Summary
Revegetation via planting indigenous vascular plants on moving or semi-moving sand dunes has been widely adopted as an effective measure for controlling desertification. Many studies have investigated the diversities of microbial functional taxa and the functional genes of BSC involved in carbon and nitrogen cycles (Yeager et al, 2012; Abed et al, 2013; Pepe-Ranney et al, 2016; Liu et al, 2018; Zhao et al, 2020a). These studies provide useful information on the microbial mechanisms by which BSC regulate the forms and contents of soil carbon and nitrogen. The microbial taxa related to P transformation and their dynamics along BSC development should be examined to further understand the microbial regulatory mechanisms of the P-cycling process
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