The shifts of maize soil microbial community and networks are related to soil properties under different organic fertilizers

Abstract

In recent years, organic fertilizer (OF) instead of chemical fertilizer is an effective way to improve the utilization efficiency of crop resources and the quality of agricultural products. However, knowledge of the effects of OF on soil microorganisms is still limited. The microbial communities in two soils of Yinchuan (P) and Guyuan (T) city were studied by high-throughput sequencing, and the correlation between their community structure and soil properties was analyzed. The 16S rRNA and ITS genes were targeted in DNA extracted from maize rhizosphere soils subjected to four OF level (0 (P1/T1), 4500 (P2/T2), 9000 (P3/T3), 13500 (P4/T4) kg/ha OF applied. Compared to the control treatment, OF treatments significantly changed soil chemical properties and microbial diversity. Additionally, OF treatments also shift composition of microbial community structure and the effects on Yinchuan (P-region) were larger than Guyuan (T-region). What's more, OF treatments also significantly affected the community composition of bacteria and fungi in the two regions, among which there were significant differences in the relative abundance of three phyla, four genera of bacteria, and eight phyla and nine genera of fungi among all OF treatments. Microbial network analysis showed that the high-OF treatments (P3 and P4) reduced the number of links in the microbial network at the genus level for the 16S rRNA gene, while increased that in T-region. Redundancy analysis (RDA) revealed that organic matter (OM) and available phosphorus (AP) were the main factors driving the bacterial and fungal community structure. In conclusion, this study demonstrated that OF treatments significantly affected soil C and P as well as the bacterial and fungal community compositions in wheat rhizosphere soils, which might affect soil biogeochemical cycles.