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Microbial composition and diversity are associated with plant performance: a case study on long-term fertilization effect on wheat growth in an Ultisol

  • Applied microbial and cell physiology
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Abstract

The association between microbial communities and plant growth in long-term fertilization system has not been fully studied. In the present study, impacts of long-term fertilization have been determined on the size and activity of soil microbial communities and wheat performance in a red soil (Ultisol) collected from Qiyang Experimental Station, China. For this, different microbial communities originating from long-term fertilized pig manure (M), mineral fertilizer (NPK), pig manure plus mineral fertilizer (MNPK), and no fertilizer (CK) were used as inocula for the Ultisol tested. Changes in total bacterial and fungal community composition and structures using Ion Torrent sequencing were determined. The results show that the biomass of wheat was significantly higher in both sterilized soil inoculated with NPK (SNPK) and sterilized soil inoculated with MNPK (SMNPK) treatments than in other treatments (P < 0.05). The activities of β-1,4-N-acetylglucosaminidase (NAG) and cellobiohydrolase (CBH) were significantly correlated with wheat biomass. Among the microbial communities, the largest Ascomycota phylum in soils was negatively correlated with β-1,4-glucosidase (βG) (P < 0.05). The phylum Basidiomycota was negatively correlated with plant biomass (PB) and tillers per plant (TI) (P < 0.05). Nonmetric multidimensional scaling analysis shows that fungal community was strongly correlated with long-term fertilization strategy, while the bacterial community was strongly correlated with β-1,4-N-acetylglucosaminidase activity. According to the Mantel test, the growth of wheat was affected by fungal community. Taken together, microbial composition and diversity in soils could be a good player in predicting soil fertility and consequently plant growth.

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Acknowledgements

This work was jointly supported by the 12th Five-Year Key Programs for Science and Technology Development of China “Study of Key Technologies for Alleviating Obstacle Factors and Improving Productivity of Low-yield Cropland” (Approved No. 2012BAD05B06), as well as grants from the National Key Basic Research Support Foundation of China (NKBRSF) (Approved No. 2015CB150502) and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Approved No. 41171208).

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  1. Key Laboratory of Plant Nutrition and Fertilizer, Ministry of Agriculture, Institute of Agricultural Resources and Regional Planning, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, 100081, China

    Lihua Li, Fenliang Fan, Alin Song, Chang Yin, Peiyuan Cui & Zhaojun Li

  2. Key Laboratory of Environment Remediation and Ecological Health, Ministry of Education, College of Environmental and Resource Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, 310058, China

    Yongchao Liang

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  1. Lihua Li
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Li, L., Fan, F., Song, A. et al. Microbial composition and diversity are associated with plant performance: a case study on long-term fertilization effect on wheat growth in an Ultisol. Appl Microbiol Biotechnol 101, 4669–4681 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00253-017-8147-2

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