Slope aspect influences soil microbial community structure and composition in the Israel arid Mediterranean

I. Moroenyane, B. M. Tripathi, J. M. Adams, S. Chen, Y. Steinberger

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

1 Scopus citations

Abstract

Microbial biogeographical patterns in Mediterranean ecosystems are becoming widely documented; however, the influences of slope aspect on the microbial community composition and structure are poorly understood. This study tested the hypotheses that slope aspect and organic matter content would influence microbial diversity patterns and distribution. Sets of five soil samples were collected from different slope aspects (north slope, south slopes, and valley bottom) and bacterial and fungal communities were examined using the 16S rRNA gene and ITS1 region sequencing, respectively, on the Illumina HiSeq platform. Organic matter and soil moisture varied significantly across all sites but did not influence microbial diversity patterns. Community structure (Bray-Curtis dissimilarity) indicated that each site had a distinct microbial community, and soil moisture along with organic matter modulated the community structure. Relative abundance of key bacterial taxa (Actinobacteria and Bacteriodetes ) and fungal taxa (Ascomycota was significantly influenced by slope aspect. Our results show, for the first time, that the often reported slope aspect dynamics of the soil microbiomes do in fact influence bacterial and fungal community composition and structure. Overall, taken together with previous studies from the region, this study provides novel insight on the physio-chemical properties that modulate the biogeographical patterns of soil microbes and contributes to our knowledge of factors that mediate microbial ecology in Mediterranean ecosystems.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)23-28
Number of pages6
JournalIsrael Journal of Ecology and Evolution
Volume67
Issue number1-2
DOIs
StatePublished - 2021

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2020

Funding

This work was supported by a grant from the National Research Foundation (NRF) funded by the Korean government Ministry of Education, Science and Technology (MEST) (NRF2013-031400) The authors declare that there are no conflicts of interests.

FundersFunder number
National Research Foundation of Korea
Ministry of Education, Science and TechnologyNRF2013-031400

    Keywords

    • 16S rRNA gene
    • Community structure
    • Galilee mountains
    • ITS region
    • Mediterranean ecosystem
    • Slope aspect

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