Which quality indicators reflect the most sensitive changes in the soil properties of the surface horizons affected by the erosion processes?

Abstract

Soil erosion, especially water erosion, is one of the most widespread types of soil degradation, not only worldwide, but also within the Czech Republic, where it endangers more than a half of the agricultural land. In addition to farming, the landscape structure has a significant impact on soil erosion in the conditions under study, where, especially in the post-war period, the collectivisation of large-scale arable land was accompanied by the abolition of the associated landscape elements. The agricultural production area of South Moravia is one of the most endangered areas in the Czech Republic, therefore, it was selected for our research, whose main objective was to verify the sensitivity of the selected physical, chemical and biochemical characteristics to identify the changes in the soil properties in the erosion processes at the identified erosion areas. The testing was carried out within a period of 5 years in 60 locations with Chernozems with cultivated corn. To assess the quality of the soil properties, indicators of soil quality from the physical, chemical and biological – biochemical groups were selected. The results of the analyses and the subsequent statistical evaluation showed that the chemical characteristics, especially those related to the quantity and quality of the organic matter, were the most sensitive to the changes in the soil properties. From the biochemical indicators, some enzymes, particularly dehydrogenase and acid phosphatase, reacted sensitively. The physical characteristics were not significantly affected by the erosion processes.

Differential assembly of root-associated bacterial and fungal communities of a dual transgenic insect-resistant maize line at different host niches and different growth stages

“…In the present study, the enzyme activities of sucrase were significantly higher in 2A-7 groups at the jointing stage compared to control B73 ( Figure 1 ), suggesting that the GM maize increased the fructose and glucose supply in soil, which further led to an increase in carbon cycling. Soil enzymes are a sensitive indicator of soil metabolic processes and fertility condition, and their activities are influenced by soil chemical properties and microbial compositions in GM plants ( Bennicelli et al, 2009 ; Li et al, 2019 ; Bila et al, 2020 ). When the high-throughput sequencing results were analyzed, there existed no significant difference between B73 and 2A-7 in the composition and function of root-associated microbial communities.…”

The host niches of soybean rather than genetic modification or glyphosate application drive the assembly of root‐associated microbial communities

“…The higher nitrogen cycling in soil cause the plants grow bigger and retain more N and take up more N, while their roots release more exudates to stimulate saprophytic microbes for mineralization at the same time. Soil enzymes are a sensitive indication of soil metabolic processes and fertility, and their activities are affected by soil chemical properties and microbial compositions under GM plants (Bennicelli et al, 2009 ; Bila et al, 2020 ; Li et al, 2019 ). However, utilizing high‐throughput sequencing analysis in this study, the nitrogen‐fixing endosymbiont genus Bradyrhizobium , which was closely related to rhizobial denitrification (Lopez et al, 2017 ), along with some copiotrophic ureolyric microbes such as Betaproteobacteria, Alphaproteobacteria, and Gammaproteobacteria which were associated with soil urease activity (Wang et al, 2019 ), showed no significant difference in abundance among Jack, JD321 and JD321G.…”