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Redox Fluctuations Frame Microbial Community Impacts on N-cycling Rates in a Humid Tropical Forest Soil

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Abstract

Fluctuating soil redox regimes may facilitate the co-occurrence of microbial nitrogen transformations with significantly different sensitivities to soil oxygen availability. In an upland humid tropical forest, we explored the impact of fluctuating redox regimes on gross nitrogen cycling rates and microbial community composition. Our results suggest that the rapidly fluctuating redox conditions that characterize these upland soils allow anoxic and oxic N processing to co-occur. Gross nitrogen mineralization was insensitive to soil redox fluctuations. In contrast, nitrifiers in this soil were directly affected by low redox periods, yet retained some activity even after 3–6 weeks of anoxia. Dissimilatory nitrate reduction to ammonium (DNRA) was less sensitive to oxygen exposure than expected, indicating that the organisms mediating this reductive process were also tolerant of unfavorable (oxic) conditions. Denitrification was a stronger sink for NO −3 in consistently anoxic soils than in variable redox soils. Microbial biomass and community composition were maintained with redox fluctuation, but biomass decreased and composition changed under static oxic and anoxic soil regimes. Bacterial community structure was significantly correlated with rates of nitrification, denitrification and DNRA, suggesting that redox-control of soil microbial community structure was an important determinant of soil N-cycling rates. Specific nitrogen cycling functional groups in this environment (such as nitrifiers, DNRA organisms, and denitrifiers) appear to have adapted to nutrient resources that are spatially and temporally variable. In soils where oxygen is frequently depleted and re-supplied, characteristics of microbial tolerance and resilience can frame N cycling patterns.

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Acknowledgments

This research was supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, NSF grants DEB-0089783 and LTER BSR-8811902, CA AES projects #7069-MS (W. Silver) and #6117-H (M. Firestone), and a graduate fellowship from the DOE Global Change Education Program. We thank E. Betts, A. Thompson, D. Herman, E. Marin-Spiotta, M.Waldrop, K. DeAngelis, D. Farmer, V. Eviner, M. Rusli, C. Hawkes, D. Bradbury, E. Dubinsky, M. McGroddy, S. Baek, R. Jackson, R. Ostertag, E. Brodie, and P. Templer for their help with laboratory analyses and/or technical assistance.

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  1. University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA

    Jennifer Pett-Ridge, Whendee L. Silver & Mary K. Firestone

  2. Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, P.O. Box 303, L-231, Livermore, CA, 94551, USA

    Jennifer Pett-Ridge

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  1. Jennifer Pett-Ridge
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  2. Whendee L. Silver
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Correspondence to Jennifer Pett-Ridge.

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Pett-Ridge, J., Silver, W.L. & Firestone, M.K. Redox Fluctuations Frame Microbial Community Impacts on N-cycling Rates in a Humid Tropical Forest Soil. Biogeochemistry 81, 95–110 (2006). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10533-006-9032-8

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