Abstract
Soil fungal communities, which drive many ecosystem processes, vary across soil horizons. However, how fungal communities are influenced by soil horizon layers remains largely unstudied. In this study, soil samples were collected from the organic horizon (O horizon) and mineral matter horizon (M horizon) in two sites of Dabie Mountain, China, and the effects of the two horizons on the soil fungal community composition were assessed based on Illumina MiSeq sequencing. Our results showed that soil fungal community composition varied with soil horizons, and soil fungal species richness and diversity in the O horizon were significantly higher than that in the M horizon. Total organic carbon (TOC), total organic nitrogen (TON), alkali-hydrolyzable nitrogen (AHN), available potassium (AK), and available phosphorus (AP) significantly influenced fungal community composition, abundance, and diversity across the two horizons (P < 0.05). Furthermore, precipitation was found to have a significant effect on fungal community composition. Our results demonstrate changes in fungal communities across soil horizons and highlight the importance of soil organic matter on fungal communities and diversity.
Highlights
Soil microorganisms play important roles in soil ecosystem functions (van Leeuwen et al, 2017)
The high-throughput Illumina sequencing yielded a total of 16,103 Operational taxonomic units (OTUs) from the O and M horizons at 90% sequence identity
The O horizon contained 12,912 OTUs from 986,805 sequences (50.48% of all sequences in the filtered dataset) that were dominated by Ascomycota and Basidiomycota (Figure 2A)
Summary
Soil microorganisms play important roles in soil ecosystem functions (van Leeuwen et al, 2017). The diversity and structure of soil microorganisms have been regarded as important indicators of soil function and quality (Huang et al, 2018). Fungi are integral to the soil microorganisms that drive many critical ecosystem processes, including the cycling of essential elements (e.g., carbon, nitrogen, phosphorus, and sulfur) and nutrients, litter decomposition, plant growth regulation, and influence on the coexistence and diversity of plant species (Teste et al, 2017; Yang et al, 2017; Liu et al, 2018). Some studies have shown that fungal diversity and community composition vary according to soil profile (van Leeuwen et al, 2017; Yang et al, 2017).
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