Reduction of microbial diversity in grassland soil is driven by long-term climate warming

Linwei Wu; Ya Zhang; Xue Guo; Daliang Ning; Xishu Zhou; Jiajie Feng; Mengting Maggie Yuan; Suo Liu; Jiajing Guo; Zhipeng Gao; Jie Ma; Jialiang Kuang; Siyang Jian; Shun Han; Zhifeng Yang; Yang Ouyang; Ying Fu; Naijia Xiao; Xueduan Liu; Liyou Wu; Aifen Zhou; Yunfeng Yang; James M Tiedje; Jizhong Zhou

doi:10.1038/s41564-022-01147-3

Reduction of microbial diversity in grassland soil is driven by long-term climate warming

Nat Microbiol. 2022 Jul;7(7):1054-1062. doi: 10.1038/s41564-022-01147-3. Epub 2022 Jun 13.

Authors

Linwei Wu^#^{1

2}, Ya Zhang^#², Xue Guo^#³, Daliang Ning², Xishu Zhou^{2

4}, Jiajie Feng², Mengting Maggie Yuan^{2

5}, Suo Liu³, Jiajing Guo^{2

6}, Zhipeng Gao^{2

7}, Jie Ma^{2

8}, Jialiang Kuang², Siyang Jian², Shun Han², Zhifeng Yang², Yang Ouyang², Ying Fu², Naijia Xiao², Xueduan Liu⁴, Liyou Wu², Aifen Zhou², Yunfeng Yang³, James M Tiedje⁹, Jizhong Zhou^{10

11

12}

Affiliations

¹ Institute of Ecology, Key Laboratory for Earth Surface Processes of the Ministry of Education, College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Peking University, Beijing, China.
² Institute for Environmental Genomics and Department of Microbiology and Plant Biology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, USA.
³ State Key Joint Laboratory of Environment Simulation and Pollution Control, School of Environment, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China.
⁴ School of Minerals Processing and Bioengineering, Central South University, Changsha, Hunan, China.
⁵ Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA.
⁶ Hunan Agriculture Product Processing Institute, Hunan Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Changsha, Hunan, China.
⁷ College of Animal Science and Technology, Hunan Agricultural University, Changsha, Hunan, China.
⁸ School of Environmental Studies, China University of Geosciences, Wuhan, Hubei, China.
⁹ Center for Microbial Ecology, Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI, USA.
¹⁰ Institute for Environmental Genomics and Department of Microbiology and Plant Biology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, USA. jzhou@ou.edu.
¹¹ School of Civil Engineering and Environmental Sciences, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, USA. jzhou@ou.edu.
¹² Earth and Environmental Sciences, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA, USA. jzhou@ou.edu.

^# Contributed equally.

PMID: 35697795
DOI: 10.1038/s41564-022-01147-3

Abstract

Anthropogenic climate change threatens ecosystem functioning. Soil biodiversity is essential for maintaining the health of terrestrial systems, but how climate change affects the richness and abundance of soil microbial communities remains unresolved. We examined the effects of warming, altered precipitation and annual biomass removal on grassland soil bacterial, fungal and protistan communities over 7 years to determine how these representative climate changes impact microbial biodiversity and ecosystem functioning. We show that experimental warming and the concomitant reductions in soil moisture play a predominant role in shaping microbial biodiversity by decreasing the richness of bacteria (9.6%), fungi (14.5%) and protists (7.5%). Our results also show positive associations between microbial biodiversity and ecosystem functional processes, such as gross primary productivity and microbial biomass. We conclude that the detrimental effects of biodiversity loss might be more severe in a warmer world.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

MeSH terms

Bacteria
Biodiversity
Ecosystem
Grassland*
Soil Microbiology
Soil*

Substances

Soil