Soil fungal and bacterial communities in southern boreal forests of the Greater Khingan Mountains and their relationship with soil properties

Thi-Minh-Dien Vuong,Xiu-Ling Man,Jian-Yong Zeng

doi:10.1038/s41598-020-79206-0

Thi-Minh-Dien Vuong, Xiu-Ling Man + Show 1 more

Open Access

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-020-79206-0

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Abstract

Little is known about the relationship between soil microbial communities and soil properties in southern boreal forests. To further our knowledge about that relationship, we compared the soil samples in southern boreal forests of the Greater Khingan Mountains—the southernmost boreal forest biome in the world. The forests can be divided into boardleaf forests dominated by birch (Betula platyphylla) or aspen (Populus davidiana) and coniferous forests dominated by larch (Larix gmelinii) or pine (Pinus sylvestris var. mongolica). Results suggested different soil microbial communities and soil properties between these southern boreal forests. Soil protease activity strongly associated with soil fungal communities in broadleaf and coniferous forests (p < 0.05), but not with soil bacterial communities (p > 0.05). Soil ammonium nitrogen and total phosphorus contents strongly associated with soil fungal and bacterial communities in broadleaf forests (p < 0.05), but not in coniferous forests (p > 0.05). Soil potassium content demonstrated strong correlations with both soil fungal and bacterial communities in broadleaf and coniferous forests (p < 0.05). These results provide evidence for different soil communities and soil properties in southern boreal forest, and further elucidate the explicit correlation between soil microbial communities and soil properties in southern boreal forests.

Highlights

Soil microbial communities are involved in many important ecological and physiological process in terrestrial ecosystems, such as turnover processes of organic matter, breakdown of pollutants, regulation of mineral nutrient availability, fixation of atmospheric nitrogen (N), and formation of m ycorrhiza[1]
Reads from fungal internal transcribed spacer (ITS) sequencing were clustered into 386 operational taxonomic units (OTU), 238 species, 165 genera, 103 families, 58 orders, 28 classes and 9 phyla
Reads from bacterial 16S rRNA gene sequencing were clustered into 1460 OTUs, 674 species, 329 genera, 222 families, 147 orders, 63 classes and 26 phyla

Summary

Introduction

Soil microbial communities are involved in many important ecological and physiological process in terrestrial ecosystems, such as turnover processes of organic matter, breakdown of pollutants, regulation of mineral nutrient availability, fixation of atmospheric nitrogen (N), and formation of m ycorrhiza[1]. Soil microbial communities can shape the soil properties such as nutrient content and hydrolase activity when regulating the microbial degradation process of soil organic matter[1]. Increasing the soil phosphorus (P) content improved soil microbial r espiration[9] and biomass[10,11] Other soil nutrients, such as carbon (C) and N, demonstrated significant effects on soil microbial community structure[12]. Previous studies have recognized the relationship between soil microbial communities and soil properties in boreal forests. To further our knowledge about that relationship, we want to conduct a research to characterize the soil fungal and bacterial communities of southern boreal forests in the Greater Khingan Mountains, and reveal their relationship with soil properties. We chose to analyze and compare the soil between two broadleaf forests (birch and aspen forests) at an average stand age of 50 years and between two coniferous forests (larch and pine forests) at an average stand age of 96 years respectively

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