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Extractable nitrogen and microbial community structure respond to grassland restoration regardless of historical context and soil composition

Grasslands have a long history of invasion by exotic annuals, which may alter microbial communities and nutrient cycling through changes in litter quality and biomass turnover rates. We compared plant community composition, soil chemical and microbial community composition, potential soil respiratio...

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Autores principales: Dickens, Sara Jo M., Allen, Edith B., Santiago, Louis S., Crowley, David
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: Oxford University Press 2015
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4323520/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25555522
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/aobpla/plu085
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author Dickens, Sara Jo M.
Allen, Edith B.
Santiago, Louis S.
Crowley, David
author_facet Dickens, Sara Jo M.
Allen, Edith B.
Santiago, Louis S.
Crowley, David
author_sort Dickens, Sara Jo M.
collection PubMed
description Grasslands have a long history of invasion by exotic annuals, which may alter microbial communities and nutrient cycling through changes in litter quality and biomass turnover rates. We compared plant community composition, soil chemical and microbial community composition, potential soil respiration and nitrogen (N) turnover rates between invaded and restored plots in inland and coastal grasslands. Restoration increased microbial biomass and fungal : bacterial (F : B) ratios, but sampling season had a greater influence on the F : B ratio than did restoration. Microbial community composition assessed by phospholipid fatty acid was altered by restoration, but also varied by season and by site. Total soil carbon (C) and N and potential soil respiration did not differ between treatments, but N mineralization decreased while extractable nitrate and nitrification and N immobilization rate increased in restored compared with unrestored sites. The differences in soil chemistry and microbial community composition between unrestored and restored sites indicate that these soils are responsive, and therefore not resistant to feedbacks caused by changes in vegetation type. The resilience, or recovery, of these soils is difficult to assess in the absence of uninvaded control grasslands. However, the rapid changes in microbial and N cycling characteristics following removal of invasives in both grassland sites suggest that the soils are resilient to invasion. The lack of change in total C and N pools may provide a buffer that promotes resilience of labile pools and microbial community structure.
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spelling pubmed-43235202015-06-17 Extractable nitrogen and microbial community structure respond to grassland restoration regardless of historical context and soil composition Dickens, Sara Jo M. Allen, Edith B. Santiago, Louis S. Crowley, David AoB Plants Research Articles Grasslands have a long history of invasion by exotic annuals, which may alter microbial communities and nutrient cycling through changes in litter quality and biomass turnover rates. We compared plant community composition, soil chemical and microbial community composition, potential soil respiration and nitrogen (N) turnover rates between invaded and restored plots in inland and coastal grasslands. Restoration increased microbial biomass and fungal : bacterial (F : B) ratios, but sampling season had a greater influence on the F : B ratio than did restoration. Microbial community composition assessed by phospholipid fatty acid was altered by restoration, but also varied by season and by site. Total soil carbon (C) and N and potential soil respiration did not differ between treatments, but N mineralization decreased while extractable nitrate and nitrification and N immobilization rate increased in restored compared with unrestored sites. The differences in soil chemistry and microbial community composition between unrestored and restored sites indicate that these soils are responsive, and therefore not resistant to feedbacks caused by changes in vegetation type. The resilience, or recovery, of these soils is difficult to assess in the absence of uninvaded control grasslands. However, the rapid changes in microbial and N cycling characteristics following removal of invasives in both grassland sites suggest that the soils are resilient to invasion. The lack of change in total C and N pools may provide a buffer that promotes resilience of labile pools and microbial community structure. Oxford University Press 2015-01-01 /pmc/articles/PMC4323520/ /pubmed/25555522 http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/aobpla/plu085 Text en Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Annals of Botany Company. http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted reuse, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
spellingShingle Research Articles
Dickens, Sara Jo M.
Allen, Edith B.
Santiago, Louis S.
Crowley, David
Extractable nitrogen and microbial community structure respond to grassland restoration regardless of historical context and soil composition
title Extractable nitrogen and microbial community structure respond to grassland restoration regardless of historical context and soil composition
title_full Extractable nitrogen and microbial community structure respond to grassland restoration regardless of historical context and soil composition
title_fullStr Extractable nitrogen and microbial community structure respond to grassland restoration regardless of historical context and soil composition
title_full_unstemmed Extractable nitrogen and microbial community structure respond to grassland restoration regardless of historical context and soil composition
title_short Extractable nitrogen and microbial community structure respond to grassland restoration regardless of historical context and soil composition
title_sort extractable nitrogen and microbial community structure respond to grassland restoration regardless of historical context and soil composition
topic Research Articles
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4323520/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25555522
http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/aobpla/plu085
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