Organic amendments (OAs) application is a practical strategy to improve soil organic carbon (SOC) in agriculture. The present study evaluated the impact of different OAs on the transformation of carbon and the dynamics of microorganisms in a 77-day incubation experiment. The OA treatments applied included wheat straw (U + WS), pig manure (U + PM), compost (U + CP), and improved compost (U + IC), and the no amendment group was the CK. After incubation, the SOC increased significantly in the U + WS group, but the other OA treatments had no significant effect relative to the CK. Among the OA treatments, U + CP and U + IC had lower CO2-C cumulative mineralization and the highest humification of dissolved organic carbon (DOC). U + PM had the lowest SOC content and the lowest aromatization of DOC. Redundancy analyses (RDA) showed that the CO2-C cumulative mineralization directly influenced the DOC, extracted organic carbon (EOC) and microbial biomass carbon (MBC) in all treatments. Proteobacteria positively correlated with SOC and MBC, Bacteroidetes were significantly related to DOC, and Gemmatimonadetes had a significant negative relationship with CO2-C cumulative mineralization. These results showed that U + CP and U + IC were more conducive to carbon sequestration, and U + PM was the most unfavourable during the incubation. Wheat straw played an important role in the steady improvement of the SOC.
Keywords: Incubation; Labile organic carbon; Mineralization; Organic substrates; Soil microbiology.
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