Proximate grassland and shrub-encroached sites show dramatic restructuring of soil bacterial communities
Background Changes in aboveground community composition and diversity following shrub encroachment have been studied extensively. Recently, shrub encroachment was associated with differences in belowground bacterial communities relative to non-encroached grassland sites hundreds of meters away. This...
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PeerJ Inc.
2019-07-01
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| Online Access: | https://peerj.com/articles/7304.pdf |
| _version_ | 1797418675110674432 |
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| author | Xingjia Xiang Sean M. Gibbons He Li Haihua Shen Haiyan Chu |
| author_facet | Xingjia Xiang Sean M. Gibbons He Li Haihua Shen Haiyan Chu |
| author_sort | Xingjia Xiang |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Background Changes in aboveground community composition and diversity following shrub encroachment have been studied extensively. Recently, shrub encroachment was associated with differences in belowground bacterial communities relative to non-encroached grassland sites hundreds of meters away. This spatial distance between grassland and shrub sites left open the question of how soil bacterial communities associated with different vegetation types might differ within the same plot location. Methods We examined soil bacterial communities between shrub-encroached and adjacent (one m apart) grassland soils in Chinese Inner Mongolian, using high-throughput sequencing method (Illumina, San Diego, CA, USA). Results Shrub-encroached sites were associated with dramatic restructuring of soil bacterial community composition and predicted metabolic function, with significant increase in bacterial alpha-diversity. Moreover, bacterial phylogenic structures showed clustering in both shrub-encroached and grassland soils, suggesting that each vegetation type was associated with a unique and defined bacterial community by niche filtering. Finally, soil organic carbon (SOC) was the primary driver varied with shifts in soil bacterial community composition. The encroachment was associated with elevated SOC, suggesting that shrub-mediated shifts in SOC might be responsible for changes in belowground bacterial community. Discussion This study demonstrated that shrub-encroached soils were associated with dramatic restructuring of bacterial communities, suggesting that belowground bacterial communities appear to be sensitive indicators of vegetation type. Our study indicates that the increased shrub-encroached intensity in Inner Mongolia will likely trigger large-scale disruptions in both aboveground plant and belowground bacterial communities across the region. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-09T06:36:17Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-86f3794fa7aa4dada19cc4a66cf4be2c |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2167-8359 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-09T06:36:17Z |
| publishDate | 2019-07-01 |
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| spelling | doaj.art-86f3794fa7aa4dada19cc4a66cf4be2c2023-12-03T10:57:00ZengPeerJ Inc.PeerJ2167-83592019-07-017e730410.7717/peerj.7304Proximate grassland and shrub-encroached sites show dramatic restructuring of soil bacterial communitiesXingjia Xiang0Sean M. Gibbons1He Li2Haihua Shen3Haiyan Chu4Anhui Province Key Laboratory of Wetland Ecological Protection and Restoration, School of Resources and Environmental Engineering, Anhui University, Hefei, ChinaInstitute for Systems Biology, Seattle, WA, USASchool of Geography, Geomatics and Planning, JiangSu Normal University, Xuzhou, ChinaState Key Laboratory of Vegetation and Environmental Change, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, ChinaState Key Laboratory of Soil and Sustainable Agriculture, Institute of Soil Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Nanjing, ChinaBackground Changes in aboveground community composition and diversity following shrub encroachment have been studied extensively. Recently, shrub encroachment was associated with differences in belowground bacterial communities relative to non-encroached grassland sites hundreds of meters away. This spatial distance between grassland and shrub sites left open the question of how soil bacterial communities associated with different vegetation types might differ within the same plot location. Methods We examined soil bacterial communities between shrub-encroached and adjacent (one m apart) grassland soils in Chinese Inner Mongolian, using high-throughput sequencing method (Illumina, San Diego, CA, USA). Results Shrub-encroached sites were associated with dramatic restructuring of soil bacterial community composition and predicted metabolic function, with significant increase in bacterial alpha-diversity. Moreover, bacterial phylogenic structures showed clustering in both shrub-encroached and grassland soils, suggesting that each vegetation type was associated with a unique and defined bacterial community by niche filtering. Finally, soil organic carbon (SOC) was the primary driver varied with shifts in soil bacterial community composition. The encroachment was associated with elevated SOC, suggesting that shrub-mediated shifts in SOC might be responsible for changes in belowground bacterial community. Discussion This study demonstrated that shrub-encroached soils were associated with dramatic restructuring of bacterial communities, suggesting that belowground bacterial communities appear to be sensitive indicators of vegetation type. Our study indicates that the increased shrub-encroached intensity in Inner Mongolia will likely trigger large-scale disruptions in both aboveground plant and belowground bacterial communities across the region.https://peerj.com/articles/7304.pdfShrub encroachmentBacterial communityGrassland ecosystemNiche filteringSequencing |
| spellingShingle | Xingjia Xiang Sean M. Gibbons He Li Haihua Shen Haiyan Chu Proximate grassland and shrub-encroached sites show dramatic restructuring of soil bacterial communities PeerJ Shrub encroachment Bacterial community Grassland ecosystem Niche filtering Sequencing |
| title | Proximate grassland and shrub-encroached sites show dramatic restructuring of soil bacterial communities |
| title_full | Proximate grassland and shrub-encroached sites show dramatic restructuring of soil bacterial communities |
| title_fullStr | Proximate grassland and shrub-encroached sites show dramatic restructuring of soil bacterial communities |
| title_full_unstemmed | Proximate grassland and shrub-encroached sites show dramatic restructuring of soil bacterial communities |
| title_short | Proximate grassland and shrub-encroached sites show dramatic restructuring of soil bacterial communities |
| title_sort | proximate grassland and shrub encroached sites show dramatic restructuring of soil bacterial communities |
| topic | Shrub encroachment Bacterial community Grassland ecosystem Niche filtering Sequencing |
| url | https://peerj.com/articles/7304.pdf |
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