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Research article2022Peer reviewedOpen access

Reactive nitrogen restructures and weakens microbial controls of soil N2O emissions

Jones, Christopher M.; Putz, Martina; Tiemann, Maren; Hallin, Sara

Abstract

Long-term, replicated fertilization field trials show that increased potential N2O production is associated with specific phylogenetic shifts in communities of frequently occurring soil microbes. This sheds light on the link between legacy effects of reactive nitrogen on microbial communities and altered regulation of N2O emissions.The global surplus of reactive nitrogen (N-r) in agricultural soils is accelerating nitrous oxide (N2O) emission rates, and may also strongly influence the microbial controls of this greenhouse gas resulting in positive feedbacks that further exacerbate N2O emissions. Yet, the link between legacy effects of N-r on microbial communities and altered regulation of N2O emissions is unclear. By examining soils with legacies of N-r-addition from 14 field experiments with different edaphic backgrounds, we show that increased potential N2O production is associated with specific phylogenetic shifts in communities of frequently occurring soil microbes. Inputs of N-r increased the complexity of microbial co-association networks, and altered the relative importance of biotic and abiotic predictors of potential N2O emissions. Our results provide a link between the microbial legacy of N-r addition and increased N2O emissions by demonstrating that biological controls of N2O emissions were more important in unfertilized soils and that these controls are weakened by increasing resource levels in soil.

Published in

Communications biology
2022, Volume: 5, number: 1, article number: 273
Publisher: NATURE PORTFOLIO