| Title | Impact of Elevational Gradients and Chemical Parameters on Changes in Soil Bacterial Diversity Under Semiarid Mountain Region |
|---|---|
| Author | Salman Khan1,2, Chun Han1,2, Awais Iqbal1, Chao Guan1,2, and Changming Zhao1,2* |
| Address | 1State Key Laboratory of Grassland Agro‑Ecosystems, School of Life Sciences, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, Gansu, People’s Republic of China, 2Gansu Provincial Field Scientific Observation and Research Station of Mountain Ecosystems, Lanzhou 730000, Gansu, People’s Republic of China |
| Bibliography | Journal of Microbiology, 61(10),903-915, 2023, |
| DOI | 10.1007/s12275-023-00085-x |
| Key Words | Semiarid environment · Xinglong Mountains · Soil bacterial diversity · Elevation · Edaphic properties |
| Abstract | Elevation gradients, often regarded as “natural experiments or laboratories”, can be used to study changes in the distribution of microbial diversity related to changes in environmental conditions that typically occur over small geographical scales. We obtained bacterial sequences using MiSeq sequencing and clustered them into operational taxonomic units (OTUs). The total number of reads obtained by the bacterial 16S rRNA sequencing analysis was 1,090,555, with an average of approximately 45,439 reads per sample collected from various elevations. The current study observed inconsistent bacterial diversity patterns in samples from the lowest to highest elevations. 983 OTUs were found common among all the elevations. The most unique OTUs were found in the soil sample from elevation_2, followed by elevation_1. Soil sample collected at elevation_6 had the least unique OTUs. Actinobacteria, Protobacteria, Chloroflexi were found most abundant bacterial phyla in current study. Ammonium nitrogen ( NH4 +-N), and total phosphate (TP) are the main factors influencing bacterial diversity at elevations_ 1. pH was the main factor influencing the bacterial diversity at elevations_2, elevation_3 and elevation_4. Our results provide new visions on forming and maintaining soil microbial diversity along an elevational gradient and have implications for microbial responses to environmental change in semiarid mountain ecosystems. |