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Variation in glomalin-related soil protein and plant growth response to arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi along a nutrient gradient in temperate grasslands

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Abstract

Purpose

The symbiosis between plants and arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi can increase soil carbon storage by contributing to glomalin-related soil protein (GRSP) and increasing plant biomass. However, increased plant available soil phosphorus (P) can disrupt the AM fungal symbiosis, which could reduce the potential for carbon storage in systems experiencing high nutrient inputs. Using two complementary approaches, we examined whether GRSP production and the ability of AM fungi to affect plant growth varied in soils sampled along a nutrient gradient.

Methods

First, GRSP and soil nutrients were sampled in a field survey of 10 grasslands to determine whether GRSP content was negatively correlated with soil P. Second, a common garden experiment evaluated GRSP production and the biomass response of Trifolium pratense to soil biota sampled from each of the 10 field sites. To evaluate the influence of AM fungi, two fractions of soil biota were used in the experiment: a whole soil inoculum than contained AM fungi along with other soil microbes and a microbial wash inoculum in which AM fungi had been removed by filtration, but which still contained other microbes.

Results

We found that GRSP content differed between field sites, but was not correlated with soil P. In the common garden experiment, GRSP production did not vary among sources of soil biota nor was it correlated with soil P from field sites for either the whole soil or microbial wash treatments. GRSP production was also higher in the microbial wash treatment, which lacked AM fungi, compared to the whole soil inoculum treatment. In addition, plant biomass was significantly higher in the whole soil vs. microbial wash treatments, and plant biomass was highest when inoculated with soil biota from sites with the highest P content.

Conclusions

The results of this study suggest that elevated soil P does not necessarily negatively impact the ability of soil microbes to produce GRSP nor does it have a negative impact on the ability of AM fungi to stimulate plant growth. Our findings are also consistent with recent work suggesting that AM fungi may not necessarily contribute to GRSP production.

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Data availability

The datasets generated during and/or analysed during the current study are available in the supplemental material.

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Acknowledgements

The authors thank K. MacColl and K. Hicks for assistance with soil collection in the field, and M. Mucci and L. Illman for assistance with maintaining plants in the greenhouse. We also thank K.E. Dunfield and C.M. Caruso for comments on the manuscript.

Funding

This work was funded by a Discovery grant (NSERC RGPIN-2018-04620) and a Discovery Accelerator Supplement grant (NSERC RGPAS-2018-522480) from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada to HM.

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  1. Department of Integrative Biology, University of Guelph, Guelph, ON, N1G 2W1, Canada

    Shelby M. Law & Hafiz Maherali

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  1. Shelby M. Law
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SML and HM were responsible for conceptualization, methodology, data curation, manuscript preparation, reviewing, and editing. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

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Correspondence to Shelby M. Law.

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Law, S.M., Maherali, H. Variation in glomalin-related soil protein and plant growth response to arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi along a nutrient gradient in temperate grasslands. Plant Soil 487, 623–637 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-023-05958-z

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