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Title: The effects of warming and soil chemistry on bacterial community structure in Arctic tundra soils

Journal Article · · Soil Biology and Biochemistry
 [1];  [2];  [2];  [2];  [2];  [3];  [4];  [5]
  1. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States); Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States)
  2. Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States)
  3. Univ. of Alaska, Fairbanks, AK (United States)
  4. Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Shenyang, Liaoning (China)
  5. Univ. of Chicago, IL (United States)

Soil microbial communities in the Arctic play a critical role in regulating the global carbon (C) cycle. Vast amounts of C are stored in northern latitude soils, and rising temperatures in the Arctic threaten to thaw permafrost, making relatively inaccessible C sources more available for mineralization by soil microbes. Few studies have characterized how microbial community structure responds to thawing permafrost in the context of varying soil chemistries associated with contrasting tundra landscapes. Here, we subjected active layer and permafrost soils from upland and lowland tundra sites on the North Slope of Alaska to a soil-warming incubation experiment and compared soil bacterial community profiles (obtained by 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing) before and after incubation. The influence of soil composition (characterized by mid-infrared [MIR] spectroscopy) on bacterial community structure and class abundance was analyzed using redundancy and correlation analyses. We found increased abundances of Alphaproteobacteria, Gammaproteobacteria, and Bacteroidetes [Sphingobacteriia] post incubation, particularly in permafrost soils. The categorical descriptors site and soil layer had the most explanatory power in our predictive models of bacterial community structure, highlighting the close relationship between soil bacteria and the soil environment. Specific soil chemical attributes characterizing the soil environments that were found to be the best predictors include MIR spectral bands associated with inorganic C, silicates, amide II (C=N stretch), and carboxylics (C-O stretch), and MIR peak ratios representing C substrate quality. Overall, these results further characterize soil bacterial community shifts that may occur as a frozen environment with limited access to C sources, such as is found in undisturbed permafrost, transitions to warmer and more C-available environments, such as is predicted in thawing permafrost due to climate change.

Research Organization:
Argonne National Lab. (ANL), Argonne, IL (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Biological and Environmental Research (BER)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC02-06CH11357
OSTI ID:
1658898
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1809302
Journal Information:
Soil Biology and Biochemistry, Vol. 148; ISSN 0038-0717
Publisher:
ElsevierCopyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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