Correlation of the abundance of bacteria catalyzing phosphorus and nitrogen turnover in biological soil crusts of temper
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ORIGINAL PAPER
Correlation of the abundance of bacteria catalyzing phosphorus and nitrogen turnover in biological soil crusts of temperate forests of Germany Julia Katharina Kurth 1,2 & Martin Albrecht 3 & Ulf Karsten 3 & Karin Glaser 3 & Michael Schloter 1,2 & Stefanie Schulz 2 Received: 30 March 2020 / Revised: 25 September 2020 / Accepted: 30 September 2020 # The Author(s) 2020
Abstract Soil P pools are strongly driven by microbial activities, and vice versa, P pools shape bacterial communities and their functional potential. Biological soil crusts (biocrusts) represent a microbial hotspot for nutrient turnover. We compared biocrusts and bulk soil samples from different temperate beech (Fagus sylvatica L.) forests representing a gradient in soil texture, nutrient concentrations, and pH values at biocrust peak biomass. We measured the total and plant-available P and N concentrations and assessed the bacterial potential to mineralize (phoD, phnX), solubilize (gcd), and take up P (pstS and pitA) and mineralize (chiA, apr) and fix N (nifH) by quantifying the respective marker genes (qPCR). We found an increase of absolute and relative bacterial abundance involved in P turnover in biocrusts, but the strategy to acquire P differed between the regions as bacteria harboring the starvation-induced pstS gene were most abundant where labile P was lowest. In contrast, the region with lowest total P concentrations has a higher potential to utilize more stable phosphonates. N mineralization was strongly correlated to P turnover at regions with increased labile N and P concentrations. Interestingly, the potential to fix N was highest in the bulk soil where total P concentrations were highest. Even though the correlation of N and P turnover is strongest if their ratio is low, the acquisition strategy strongly depends on soil properties. Keywords Biological soil crust . Microbial N turnover . Microbial P turnover . Temperate forest . qPCR . Biodiversity Exploratories
Introduction Many terrestrial habitats are limited in the major nutrients P and N (Elser et al. 2007). The P concentration of the parent Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s00374-020-01515-3) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. * Stefanie Schulz [email protected] 1
Department of Ecology and Ecosystem Management, TUM School of Life Science Weihenstephan, Chair of Soil Science, Technical University of Munich, Emil-Ramann-Straße 2, 85354 Freising, Germany
2
Research Unit Comparative Microbiome Analyses, Helmholtz Zentrum München, Ingolstädter Landstraße 1, 85764 Neuherberg, Germany
3
Department of Applied Ecology & Phycology, Institute of Biological Sciences, University of Rostock, Albert-Einstein-Strasse 3, 18057 Rostock, Germany
rock material, the turnover of the internally bound organic P, and the sorption of P onto soil particles most importantly determine the P availability in forest soils, as fertilizer hardly plays a role (Walker and Syers
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