Soil structure, nutrient status and water holding capacity shape Uruguayan grassland prokaryotic communities. Issue 12 (10th October 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Garaycochea, Silvia; Romero, Héctor; Beyhaut, Elena; Neal, Andrew L; Altier, Nora
• Is Part Of: FEMS microbiology ecology. Volume 96:Issue 12(2020)
• Publication Date: 2020-10-10
• Subjects: Campos biome -- natural grasslands -- prokaryotic communities -- soil nutrients -- soil physicochemical variables -- soil structure -- soil; Microbial ecology -- Periodicals; Microbiology -- Periodicals; 579.17
• DOI: 10.1093/femsec/fiaa207
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 0168-6496

Abstract

ABSTRACT: Soil microbial communities play critical roles in maintaining natural ecosystems such as the Campos biome grasslands of southern South America. These grasslands are characterized by a high diversity of soils, low available phosphorus (P) and limited water holding capacity. This work aimed to describe prokaryotic communities associated with different soil types and to examine the relationship among these soil communities, the parent material and the soil nutrient status. Five Uruguayan soils with different parent material and nutrient status, under natural grasslands, were compared. The structure and diversity of prokaryotic communities were characterized by sequencing 16S rRNA gene amplicons. Proteobacteria, Actinobacteria, Firmicutes, Verrucomicrobia, Acidobacteria, Planctomycetes and Chloroflexi were the predominant phyla. Ordination based on several distance measures was able to discriminate clearly between communities associated with different soil types. Edge-PCA phylogeny-sensitive ordination and differential relative abundance analyses identified Archaea and the bacterial phyla Firmicutes, Acidobacteria, Actinobacteria and Verrucomicrobia as those with significant differences among soil types. Canonical analysis of principal coordinates identified porosity, clay content, available P, soil organic carbon and water holding capacity as the main variables contributing to determine the characteristic prokaryotic communities of each soil type. Abstract : This study shows the influence of the soil nutrient status and water holding capacity on the structure of soil prokaryotic communities of natural grassland ecosystem of Campos biome.