Specific impacts of beech and Norway spruce on the structure and diversity of the rhizosphere and soil microbial communities

Abstract

The impacts of plant species on the microbial communities and physico-chemical characteristics of soil are well documented for many herbs, grasses and legumes but much less so for tree species. Here, we investigate by rRNA and ITS amplicon sequencing the diversity of microorganisms from the three domains of life (Archaea, Bacteria and Eukaryota:Fungi) in soil samples taken from the forest experimental site of Breuil-Chenue (France). We discovered significant differences in the abundance, composition and structure of the microbial communities associated with two phylogenetically distant tree species of the same age, deciduous European beech (Fagus sylvatica) and coniferous Norway spruce (Picea abies Karst), planted in the same soil. Our results suggest a significant effect of tree species on soil microbiota though in different ways for each of the three microbial groups. Fungal and archaeal community structures and compositions are mainly determined according to tree species, whereas bacterial communities differ to a great degree between rhizosphere and bulk soils, regardless of the tree species. These results were confirmed by quantitative PCR, which revealed significant enrichment of specific bacterial genera, such as Burkholderia and Collimonas, known for their ability to weather minerals within the tree root vicinity.

Tree Root Zone Microbiome: Exploring the Magnitude of Environmental Conditions and Host Tree Impact

“…Our findings agree with the previously reported ectomycorrhizal status of oaks (Herrmann and Buscot, 2007) and the tree ability to interact with large microbial communities which assist in nutrients acquisition (Jumpponen and Jones, 2009;Tarkka et al, 2013). The tree rootassociated microorganisms are well-known to serve in improving tree health and nutrition, preventing establishment of pathogens, and adapting to specific local environmental conditions (Uroz et al, 2016;Gehring et al, 2017;Lau et al, 2017).…”

Soil abiotic variables are more important than Salicaceae phylogeny or habitat specialization in determining soil microbial community structure

“…Most studies on soil bacteria and archaea responses to plant identity have examined taxonomically diverse plant species (Angel, Soares, Ungar, & Gillor, ; Nacke et al., ; Scheibe et al., ; Schlatter, Bakker, Bradeen, & Kinkel, ; Uroz et al., ). Many find that tree species identity explains a small proportion of the variation in soil bacterial community composition (Schlatter et al., ; Urbanova et al., ; Uroz et al., ), or that one particular plant species explains the difference in community composition (Schlatter et al., ). Our findings fit within these studies, but we found that species identity at a narrow phylogenetic scale, primarily within the Salix genus, can differentiate soil microbial communities even if the overall effects are small.…”

Effects of Two Trichoderma Strains on Plant Growth, Rhizosphere Soil Nutrients, and Fungal Community of Pinus sylvestris var. mongolica Annual Seedlings

“…The differences were considered statistically significant at a 0.05 probability level in this study. Mothur software [42] was employed to analyze the alpha diversity index and rarefaction, and the coverage index was used to represent the sequencing depth index. The Ace (https://www.mothur.org/wiki/Ace) and Chao1 (https://www.mothur.org/wiki/Chao) indexes were used to represent the community abundance, while the Shannon (https://www.mothur.org/wiki/Shannon) and Simpson (https://www.mothur.org/wiki/Simpson) indexes were used to represent the species richness and diversity of the fungal community [43,44].…”