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Management practices have a major impact on nitrifier and denitrifier communities in a semiarid grassland ecosystem

  • Soils, Sec 2 • Global Change, Environ Risk Assess, Sustainable Land Use • Research Article
  • Published:
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Abstract

Purpose

Nitrification and denitrification, two of the key nitrogen (N) transformation processes in the soil, are carried out by a diverse range of microorganisms and catalyzed by a series of enzymes. Different management practices, such as continuous grazing, mowing, and periodic fencing off from grazing, dramatically influenced grassland ecosystems. This study aimed to examine the effects of management practices on the abundance and community structure of nitrifier and denitrifier communities in grassland ecosystems.

Materials and methods

Soil samples were collected from a semiarid grassland ecosystem in Xilingol region, Inner Mongolia, where long-term management practices including free-grazing, different periods of enclosure from grazing, and different frequencies of mowing were conducted. Real-time quantitative polymerase chain reaction (Q-PCR), denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis (DGGE), sequencing, and phylogenetic analysis were applied to estimate the abundance and composition of amoA, nirS, nirK, and nosZ genes.

Results and discussion

The ammonia-oxidizing archaea (AOA) amoA copies were in the range 5.99 × 108 to 8.60 × 108, while those of ammonia-oxidizing bacteria (AOB) varied from 3.02 × 107 to 4.61 × 107. The abundance of AOA was substantially higher in the light grazing treatment (LG) than in the mowing treatments. The quantity and intensity of DGGE bands of AOA varied with pasture management. In stark contrast, AOB population abundance and community structure remained largely unchanged in all the soils irrespective of the management practices. All these results suggested that ammonia oxidizers were dominated by AOA. The higher gene abundance and greater intensity of DGGE bands of nirS and nosZ under the enclosure treatments would suggest greater stimulated denitrification. The ratio of nosZ/(nirS + nirK) was higher in mowing treatments than in the free-grazing and enclosure treatments, possibly leading to more complete denitrification. Correlation analysis indicated that soil moisture and inorganic nitrogen content were the two main soil environmental variables that influence the community structure of nitrifiers and denitrifiers.

Conclusions

In this semiarid neutral to alkaline grassland ecosystem under low temperature conditions, AOA mainly affiliated with Nitrososphaera dominated nitrification. These results clearly demonstrate that grassland management practices can have a major impact on nitrifier and denitrifier communities in this semiarid grassland ecosystem, under low temperature conditions.

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Acknowledgments

This work was financially supported by the National Key Basic Research Program of China (2014CB138801) and Natural Science Foundation of China (41271272 and 41230857).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Zhejiang Provincial Key Laboratory of Subtropic Soil and Plant Nutrition, College of Environmental and Resource Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, 310058, People’s Republic of China

    Hong Pan, Yong Li, Xiongming Guan, Jiangye Li, Xiaoya Xu, Jun Liu, Qichun Zhang, Jianming Xu & Hongjie Di

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  1. Hong Pan
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  2. Yong Li
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Correspondence to Yong Li.

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Pan, H., Li, Y., Guan, X. et al. Management practices have a major impact on nitrifier and denitrifier communities in a semiarid grassland ecosystem. J Soils Sediments 16, 896–908 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-015-1321-1

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