Plant, Soil and Environment

G. Song ¹, R. Chen ², W. Xiang ¹, F. Yang ³, S. Zheng ¹, J. Zhang ¹, J. Zhang ², X. Lin ²

Affiliations
1 State Key Laboratory of Agricultural Microbiology, College of Life Science and Technology, Huazhong Agricultural University, Wuhan, CN
2 State Key Laboratory of Soil and Sustainable Agriculture, Joint Open Laboratory of Soil and the Environment, Hong Kong Baptist University and Institute of Soil Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Nanjing, CN
3 Department of Plant and Environmental Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Frederiksberg, DK

Abstract

The changes of saprotrophic fungi (SF) and symbiotic arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) in response to different fertilizers were investigated in a period of 21 years. Denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis profiles showed fungal community structure significantly changed after long-term fertilization. Long-term organic and mineral fertilization significantly increased the SF diversity, whereas mineral fertilization decreased the AMF diversity. SF quantity significantly increased in response to organic fertilizers, whereas the AMF propagules were down-regulated by nutrient-rich fertilization but induced by N, P or K-deficiency. Redundancy analysis showed that long-term fertilization differentially affected diversity and quantity of SF and AMF. Nutrient-rich organic fertilizers, resulting in higher contents of soil organic C (SOC), total N and mineral N, total and available P, regulated the quantity and diversity of SF positively and quantity of AMF negatively, respectively. The diversity of AMF was slightly down-regulated by SOC, total and mineral N and total P as well as the nutrient-rich mineral treatments, in contrast to the positive effects by available K and P. These results indicate that soil nutritional status and fertilizer types significantly affect SF and AMF. Our study of soil fungal community in response to the long-term fertilization can provide new strategies for agronomic practice.

Keywords

Fungal rRNA Gene, Shannon-Wiener Diversity, Fungal Quantity, Microbial Communities, Quantitative-PCR.

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