Implications of Plant Invasion on the Soil Microbial Diversity and Ecosystem Sustainability: Evidence from a Tropical Biodiversity Hot Spot

Abstract

AbstractInvasive plants are a major threat to the conservation of biological diversity and ecosystem sustainability across the globe with the associated socio-economic consequences. In addition to this, anthropogenic climate change is mounting new challenges to conservation professionals in controlling invasive plant populations and in mitigating the impacts of invasions on ecosystem stress. While ecosystem restoration depends heavily on the management of the edaphic environment, especially on soil microbiota, which fulfills an important share in ecosystem process, regeneration, and resilience. However, the effects of plant invasions on soil microbial populations and how ecosystem sustainability is impacted are not well explored. This chapter presents a review of scholarship on the role played by soil microbial populations in ecosystem processes and sustainability. This is a synthesis of observations from various ecosystems on the changes in root-zone microbial diversity in the context of plant invasions. The insights from the review are brought forth to discuss a case of plant invasion in forest tracts in the Western Ghats—a global biodiversity hotspot—in Peninsular India, to draw insights on the shifts in soil root zone microbial populations and its possible consequences on the ecosystem sustainability.KeywordsAlien invasive plantsInvasionAllelochemicalsAllelopathyDetoxification