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The temporal profile of GH1 gene abundance and the shift in GH1 cellulase-producing microbial communities during vermicomposting of corn stover and cow dung

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Abstract

Vermicomposting is a promising method for corn stover management to achieve bioresource recovery and environmental protection. Most β-glucosidases, which limit the cellulose degradation rate during vermicomposting of corn stover, belong to glycoside hydrolase family 1 (GH1). This study was conducted with different earthworm densities to quantify the GH1 gene abundance and investigate the evolution of GH1 cellulase-producing microbial communities using qPCR and pyrosequencing. The results showed that β-glucosidase activity, GH1 gene abundance, TOC, and microbial communities carrying the GH1 gene were affected by processing time and earthworm density. After introducing earthworms, β-glucosidase activity increased to 1.90–2.13 U/g from 0.54 U/g. The GH1 gene abundance of treatments with earthworms (5.82E+09–6.70E+09 copies/g) was significantly higher than that of treatments without earthworms (2.48E+09 copies/g) on Day 45. Earthworms increased the richness of microbial communities. The relative abundances of Sphingobium and Dyadobacter, which are dominant genera harboring the GH1 gene, were increased by earthworms to peak values of 23.90% and 11.20%, respectively. Correlation analysis showed that Sphingobium, Dyadobacter, Trichoderma, and Starkeya were positively associated with β-glucosidases. This work sheds new light on the mechanism of cellulose degradation during vermicomposting at the molecular level.

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Acknowledgements

The authors appreciate the Tutools platform (http://www.cloudtutu.com), a free online data analysis website. The authors express their gratitude to the anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments and suggestions.

Funding

This work was supported by the Strategic Priority Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDA28110201), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (31872178), and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (32171913).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Biological and Agricultural Engineering, Jilin University, Changchun, 130022, China

    Yuxiang Chen, Jiaolin Li, Tingting Zhao & Lei Zhang

  2. Costal Research and Extension Center, Mississippi State University, Mississippi, MS, 39567, USA

    Yan Zhang

  3. College of Life Sciences, Jilin University, Changchun, 130012, China

    Lixin Xu

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  1. Yuxiang Chen
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Contributions

Yuxiang Chen: conceptualization, methodology, supervision, funding acquisition, project administration, writing—review and editing. Jiaolin Li: writing—original draft, writing—review and editing. Tingting Zhao: data curation. Yan Zhang: data curation. Lei Zhang: data curation. Lixin Xu: methodology, supervision, data curation, project administration.

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Correspondence to Lixin Xu.

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The present study was carried out at the College of Biological and Agricultural Engineering, Jilin University, Changchun, China. The experimental protocol used in the study was approved by the Institutional Animal Care and Use Committee of Jilin University, Changchun, China.

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Supplementary information

ESM 1:

Fig. S1 The heatmap of microbial community structure during vermicomposting at the genus level. “T” denotes substrates composed of 60% corn stover and 40% cow dung. “i” means the initial samples, and “p” means the samples after having been pre-composted for 15 days. “x” of Txy denotes the earthworm density, and “x” ranging from 1 to 4 denotes 0, 60, 120 and 180 earthworms/kg substrate. “y” of Txy denotes the sampling time series, and “y” including 3 and 4 denotes day 30 and day 45, respectively

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Chen, Y., Li, J., Zhao, T. et al. The temporal profile of GH1 gene abundance and the shift in GH1 cellulase-producing microbial communities during vermicomposting of corn stover and cow dung. Environ Sci Pollut Res 30, 84035–84045 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11356-023-28341-y

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