Protozoa of biological soil crusts of a cool desert in Utah

The community structure of soil Sarcodina in Baiyun Mountain, Guangzhou, China

“…This accords with other terrestrial regions of the world [4,13,22,28], though their dominant species were different. Ekelund and Rønn [12] considered that testate amoebae are K-selected; whereas, most other Protozoa (smaller naked amoebae and flagellates for example) are r-selected, especially the groups that feed on bacteria.…”

“…Among these factors, the most significant one was OM (R 2 ¼ 0.920), followed by SM (R 2 ¼ 0.908), pH (R 2 ¼ 0.908), AN (R 2 ¼ 0.723) and TN (R 2 ¼ 0.608), while the effect of TK (R 2 ¼ 0.560) was the least. On the other hand, TP, NN and SO 4 2-showed no significant effect (P > 0.05) on sarcodina abundance in the present study.…”

“…The regional soil of Baiyun Mountain is latosolic red soil with shortage of certain nutrient elements, which may account in part for the little correlation between sarcodina abundance and TP and SO 4 2-reported here; though Liao et al [22] reported that sarcodina abundance correlated significantly with TP in air-dried soil samples of Dongzhaigang Mangrove forest.…”

“…The pH values were obtained by using a 1:5 soil/water solution with electrical conductivity (automatic, temperature-compensated conductivity meter). The content of organic matter (OM), total nitrogen (TN), total phosphorus (TP), total potassium (kalium, TK) and sulphate (SO 4 2-) were analyzed by the acid-dichromate oxidation method, the semi-micro Kjeldahl method, the ammonium molybdate spectrophotometry method, the flame photometer method and barium sulphate turbidity, respectively. Determination of ammonia nitrogen (AN) was processed by the indophenol blue colorimetric method, nitrate nitrogen (NN) by the copperized cadmium reduction method.…”

Are heterotrophic and silica-rich eukaryotic microbes an important part of the lichen symbiosis?

“…There are a small number of studies showing testate amoebae species associated with lichens in the Arctic (Beyens et al 1986, 1990). Bamforth (2008) recorded not only testates from lichens in the Utah Desert, USA, but also naked amoebae and ciliates too. One of the reasons that lichens survive in such extreme habitats is that they can have a remarkable ability to tolerate complete drying out for long periods (Gilbert 2000).…”