The response of nutrient cycle, microbial community abundance and metabolic function to nitrogen fertilizer in rhizosphere soil of Phellodendron chinense Schneid seedlings

Yuanzheng Gu; Xianglin Chen; Yan Shen; Xiaoyong Chen; Gongxiu He; Xinxing He; Guangjun Wang; Hanjie He; Zhencheng Lv

doi:10.3389/fmicb.2023.1302775

The response of nutrient cycle, microbial community abundance and metabolic function to nitrogen fertilizer in rhizosphere soil of Phellodendron chinense Schneid seedlings

Front Microbiol. 2023 Dec 15:14:1302775. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2023.1302775. eCollection 2023.

Authors

Yuanzheng Gu^#^{1

2

3}, Xianglin Chen^#^{1

2

3}, Yan Shen^{1

2

3}, Xiaoyong Chen⁴, Gongxiu He^{1

2

3}, Xinxing He^{1

2

3}, Guangjun Wang^{1

2

3}, Hanjie He^{1

2

3}, Zhencheng Lv⁵

Affiliations

¹ National Engineering Laboratory for Applied Technology of Forestry & Ecology in South China, Central South University of Forestry and Technology, Changsha, Hunan, China.
² Hunan Provincial Key Laboratory of Forestry Biotechnology, Central South University of Forestry and Technology, Changsha, Hunan, China.
³ International Cooperation Base of Science and Technology Innovation on Forest Resource Biotechnology, Central South University of Forestry and Technology, Changsha, Hunan, China.
⁴ College of Arts and Sciences, Governors State University, University Park, IL, United States.
⁵ School of Life Sciences, Huizhou University, Huizhou, Guangdong, China.

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Nitrogen (N) as an essential macronutrient affects the soil nutrient cycle, microbial community abundance, and metabolic function. However, the specific responses of microorganisms and metabolic functions in rhizosphere soil of Phellodendron chinense Schneid seedlings to N addition remain unclear. In this study, four treatments (CK, N5, N10 and N15) were conducted, and the soil physicochemical properties, enzyme activities, microbial community abundances and diversities, metabolism, and gene expressions were investigated in rhizosphere soil of P. chinense Schneid. The results showed that N addition significantly decreased rhizosphere soil pH, among which the effect of N10 treatment was better. N10 treatment significantly increased the contents of available phosphorus (AP), available potassium (AK), ammonium nitrogen (NH₄⁺-N), nitrate nitrogen (NO₃^--N) and sucrase (SU) activity, as well as fungal diversity and the relative expression abundances of amoA and phoD genes in rhizosphere soil, but observably decreased the total phosphorus (TP) content, urease (UR) activity and bacterial diversity, among which the pH, soil organic matter (SOM), AP, NH₄⁺-N and NO₃^--N were the main environmental factors for affecting rhizosphere soil microbial community structure based on RDA and correlation analyses. Meanwhile, N10 treatment notably enhanced the absolute abundances of the uracil, guanine, indole, prostaglandin F2α and γ-glutamylalanine, while reduced the contents of D-phenylalanine and phenylacetylglycine in rhizosphere soil of P. chinense Schneid seedlings. Furthermore, the soil available nutrients represented a significant correlation with soil metabolites and dominant microorganisms, suggesting that N10 addition effectively regulated microbial community abundance and metabolic functions by enhancing nutrient cycle in the rhizosphere soil of P. chinense Schneid seedlings.

Keywords: Phellodendron chinense Schneid; gene expression; nitrogen; soil metabolism; soil microorganism.

Grants and funding

The author(s) declare financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. This research was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 32071752), by the Department of Science and Technology of Hunan Province (grant nos. 2020NK2018, 2022NK2018, and 2021RC2083).