Importance of denitrifiers lacking the genes encoding the nitrous oxide reductase for N2O emissions from soil
Analyses of the complete genomes of sequenced denitrifying bacteria revealed that approximately 1/3 have a truncated denitrification pathway, lacking the nosZ gene encoding the nitrous oxide reductase. We investigated whether the number of denitrifiers lacking the genetic ability to synthesize the nitrous oxide reductase in soils is important for the proportion of N2O emitted by denitrification. Serial dilutions of the denitrifying strain Agrobacterium tumefaciens C58 lacking the nosZ gene were inoculated into three different soils to modify the proportion of denitrifiers having the nitrous oxide reductase genes. The potential denitrification and N2O emissions increased when the size of ino…
Loss in microbial diversity affects nitrogen cycling in soil
International audience; Microbial communities have a central role in ecosystem processes by driving the Earth's biogeochemical cycles. However, the importance of microbial diversity for ecosystem functioning is still debated. Here, we experimentally manipulated the soil microbial community using a dilution approach to analyze the functional consequences of diversity loss. A trait-centered approach was embraced using the denitrifiers as model guild due to their role in nitrogen cycling, a major ecosystem service. How various diversity metrics related to richness, eveness and phylogenetic diversity of the soil denitrifier community were affected by the removal experiment was assessed by 454 s…
Relationship between N-cycling communities and ecosystem functioning in a 50-year-old fertilization experiment.
The relative importance of size and composition of microbial communities in ecosystem functioning is poorly understood. Here, we investigated how community composition and size of selected functional guilds in the nitrogen cycle correlated with agroecosystem functioning, which was defined as microbial process rates, total crop yield and nitrogen content in the crop. Soil was sampled from a 50-year fertilizer trial and the treatments comprised unfertilized bare fallow, unfertilized with crop, and plots with crop fertilized with calcium nitrate, ammonium sulfate, solid cattle manure or sewage sludge. The size of the functional guilds and the total bacterial community were greatly affected by …
Soil carbon quality and nitrogen fertilization structure bacterial communities with predictable responses of major bacterial phyla
Abstract Agricultural practices affect the soil ecosystem in multiple ways and the soil microbial communities represent an integrated and dynamic measure of soil status. Our aim was to test whether the soil bacterial community and the relative abundance of major bacterial phyla responded predictably to long-term organic amendments representing different carbon qualities (peat and straw) in combination with nitrogen fertilization levels and if certain bacterial groups were indicative of specific treatments. We hypothesized that the long-term treatments had created distinctly different ecological niches for soil bacteria, suitable for either fast-growing copiotrophic bacteria, or slow-growing…
Loss in microbial diversity affects nitrogen cycling in soil
National audience; Microbial communities have a central role in ecosystem processes by driving the Earth’s biogeochemical cycles. However, the importance of microbial diversity for ecosystem functioning is still debated. Here, we experimentally manipulated the soil microbial community using a dilution approach to analyze the functional consequences of diversity loss. A trait-centered approach was embraced using the denitrifiers as model guild due to their role in nitrogen cycling, a major ecosystem service. How various diversity metrics related to richness, eveness and phylogenetic diversity of the soil denitrifier community were affected by the removal experiment was assessed by 454 sequen…