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Mycorrhizal and rhizospheric fungal community assembly differs during subalpine forest restoration on the eastern Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau

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Abstract

Background and aims

Mycorrhizosphere is the interface between roots and soil where a myriad of microorganisms mediate plant growth, nutrient acquisition and tolerance to biotic and abiotic stress, and result in driving ecosystem biogeochemical cycling. Understanding the complexity and dynamics of mycorrhizosphere and its ecology and evolution are critical to enhancing forest productivity and ecosystem functioning, especially in high latitude temperate or high altitude alpine forests. However, the fungal community compositions and their driving ecological mechanisms of mycorrhizosphere during forest restoration are poorly documented.

Methods

In this study, we simultaneously examined the ectomycorrhizal (EM) and rhizospheric fungal communities of two dominant host tree species (Abies faxoniana and Betula albosinensis) in subalpine forest communities with distinct forest restoration stages (30- vs. 60-year) after clear-cutting. Illumina MiSeq sequencing of internal transcribed spacer 2 (ITS2) sequences was adopted.

Results

A total of 1222 EM and 5880 rhizosphere fungal operational taxonomic units (OTUs) were obtained at a 97% sequence similarity level, which were mainly dominated by Basidiomycota. Host identity and forest restoration stage had no significant effects on fungal species richness of both EM and rhizospheric fungi. However, the community assembly of EM and rhizospheric fungi was significantly different during forest restoration, with opposite patterns shown on ectomycorrhizae and rhizosphere. The EM fungal community assembly was significantly affected by host identity, stand age and population dynamic, while the rhizosphere fungal community was significantly structured by combinations of host trees biomass, soil properties and spatial distance.

Conclusions

Our data provide important insights that community assembly of EM and rhizosphere fungi may respond idiosyncratically during forest restoration, which will help us deeper understanding forest succession, stability and ecosystem functioning on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau.

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Acknowledgements

This study was funded by the Fundamental Research Funds of CAF (CAFYBB2018ZA003); the National Key R & D Program of China (2016YFC0502104; 2017YFC0505001). We greatly thank Liangdong Guo of the Institute of Microbiology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Xiangzhen Li and Minjie Yao of Chengdu Institute of Biology, Chinese Academy of Sciences for providing insightful comments and constructive suggestions for revising an early draft of this article; and three anonymous reviewers for their valuable comments. We are also indebted to Pengpeng Lv, Hui Yao, Yonglong Wang and Maoping Li for assistance in bioinformation analysis and Dr. Ji Chen in grammatical correction. The study was prompted by the field assistance received from Xingliang Liu and Qiuhong Feng of Institute of Ecology, Sichuan Academy of Forestry and Peihao Peng of Chengdu University of Technology.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key laboratory of Forest Ecology and Environment of National Forestry and Grassland Administration, Research Institute of Forest Ecology, Environment and Protection, Chinese Academy of Forestry, Beijing, 100091, China

    Gexi Xu, Huanhuan Chen, Zuomin Shi, Shun Liu, Xiangwen Cao, Miaomiao Zhang, Miao Chen, Jian Chen, Kai Xiong & Guangdong Zhao

  2. Co-Innovation Center for Sustainable Forestry in Southern China, Nanjing Forestry University, Nanjing, 210037, China

    Zuomin Shi

  3. Institute for Sustainable Plant Protection, National Research Council of Italy, 10135, Torino, Italy

    Zuomin Shi

  4. Institute of Wetland Research, Chinese Academy of Forestry, Beijing, 100091, China

    Hongguo Yang

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  1. Gexi Xu
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  2. Huanhuan Chen
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  3. Zuomin Shi
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  11. Guangdong Zhao
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Contributions

Idea and study design: G.X., H.C. and Z.S.; data collection and analysis: H.C. and G.X. with support from S.L., X.C., M.Z., M.C., J.C., K.X., H.Y., G.Z.; writing of the manuscript: G.X., H.C. and Z.S., with all authors contributing substantially to revisions.

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Correspondence to Zuomin Shi.

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Xu, G., Chen, H., Shi, Z. et al. Mycorrhizal and rhizospheric fungal community assembly differs during subalpine forest restoration on the eastern Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau. Plant Soil 458, 245–259 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-019-04400-7

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