6533b825fe1ef96bd1281b8e

RESEARCH PRODUCT

Deciphering biotic interactions and their role in soil microbial community assembly

subject

description

National audience; Soil microbial communities play key roles in ecosystem functioning. Yet, little is known aboutthe importance of microbe-microbe interactions in soil microbial community assembly andfunctions. To address this knowledge gap, the objective of my thesis is to assess the role ofinteractions between micro-organisms in soil microbial communities. For this purpose, we willmanipulate the interactions between microorganisms within complex soil microbialcommunities by (i) removing different members of the soil community, (ii) adding microbialtaxa to the soil community and (iii) increasing the physical distance between members of thesoil community. How shifts in microbial interactions affect community assembly will bedetermined after recolonization of sterile soil microcosms by the inoculated communitiesduring several weeks. The resulting communities will be analyzed by 16S rRNA and 18S rRNAmetabarcoding and bioinformatics tools such as network inference to identify the interactingcommunity members. The consequences on community functions will be assessed for C and Ncycles. This thesis project should allow unravelling soil microbial community assembly rulesand the assessment of community manipulation impact on soil functions, therefore paving theway to steer soil microbial communities in agroecosystems.