TY - JOUR
T1 - The differentiation of soil bacterial communities along a precipitation and temperature gradient in the eastern Inner Mongolia steppe
AU - Yao, Minjie
AU - Rui, Junpeng
AU - Niu, Haishan
AU - Heděnec, Petr
AU - Li, Jiabao
AU - He, Zhili
AU - Wang, Junming
AU - Cao, Weidong
AU - Li, Xiangzhen
N1 - Funding Information:
The authors thank the support by National Natural Science Foundation of China (41371268, 41301272, 31300447, 31670503), Strategic Priority Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDB15010303), Chinese Academy of Sciences Fellowships for Young International Scientists (2013Y2SB0003), Special Fund for Agro-scientific Research in the Public Interest (201103005), and Science and Technology Innovation Project of Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences. Opinions expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the Illinois State Water Survey, the Prairie Research Institute, the University of Illinois, or the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
Publisher Copyright:
© 2017
PY - 2017/5/1
Y1 - 2017/5/1
N2 - Understanding the differentiation of soil bacterial communities under precipitation and temperature gradients is crucial for assessing the impacts of environmental filters on ecosystem structure and function. Here we investigated spatial variations of bacterial communities along a precipitation and temperature transect in the eastern Inner Mongolia steppe, China. The aims are to understand the biogeographic pattern and key drivers shaping soil bacterial communities along the transect. Our results showed that the soil bacterial community along the 451-km transect exhibited the distance-decay relationship, decreasing in community similarity with geographic distance. Obvious changes in the bacterial community structure occurred at an annual precipitation from 215 to 261 mm, which was close to the boundary between arid and semi-arid systems. The relative abundances of Proteobacteria, Bacteroidetes, and Acidobacteria increased with precipitation, while those of Actinobacteria, Chloroflexi, and Gemmatimonadetes decreased. Environmental filtering was observed to be the key in shaping bacterial biogeographic patterns, and climate conditions exert indirect effects on soil bacterial communities mainly through direct effects on soil properties. Soil pH and plant coverage were important to soil bacterial communities in both arid and semi-arid steppes. Our findings provided insights for understanding the linkages among geographic distance, environmental filters, and soil bacterial communities in Eurasian steppe ecosystems.
AB - Understanding the differentiation of soil bacterial communities under precipitation and temperature gradients is crucial for assessing the impacts of environmental filters on ecosystem structure and function. Here we investigated spatial variations of bacterial communities along a precipitation and temperature transect in the eastern Inner Mongolia steppe, China. The aims are to understand the biogeographic pattern and key drivers shaping soil bacterial communities along the transect. Our results showed that the soil bacterial community along the 451-km transect exhibited the distance-decay relationship, decreasing in community similarity with geographic distance. Obvious changes in the bacterial community structure occurred at an annual precipitation from 215 to 261 mm, which was close to the boundary between arid and semi-arid systems. The relative abundances of Proteobacteria, Bacteroidetes, and Acidobacteria increased with precipitation, while those of Actinobacteria, Chloroflexi, and Gemmatimonadetes decreased. Environmental filtering was observed to be the key in shaping bacterial biogeographic patterns, and climate conditions exert indirect effects on soil bacterial communities mainly through direct effects on soil properties. Soil pH and plant coverage were important to soil bacterial communities in both arid and semi-arid steppes. Our findings provided insights for understanding the linkages among geographic distance, environmental filters, and soil bacterial communities in Eurasian steppe ecosystems.
KW - Environmental filtering
KW - Inner Mongolia steppe
KW - Precipitation and temperature gradient
KW - Soil bacterial community
KW - Spatial distribution
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U2 - 10.1016/j.catena.2017.01.007
DO - 10.1016/j.catena.2017.01.007
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85008675413
VL - 152
SP - 47
EP - 56
JO - Catena
JF - Catena
SN - 0341-8162
ER -