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Publication

Subordinate plants mitigate drought effects on soil ecosystem processes by stimulating fungi

Alexandre Buttler, Vincent Eric Jules Jassey, Pierre Rémi Mariotte, Bjorn Jozef Maria Robroek
2015
Journal Articles

Abstract

The subordinate insurance hypothesis suggests that highly diverse communities contain greater numbers of subordinate species than less diverse communities. It has previously been reported that subordinate species can improve grassland productivity during drought, but the underlying mechanisms remain undetermined. 2. Using a combination of subordinate species removal and summer drought, we show that soil processes play a critical role in community resistance to drought. Interestingly, subordinate species drive soil microbial community structure and largely mitigate the effect of drought on grassland soil functioning. Our results highlight subordinate species in shifting the balance within the phospholipid fatty acid (PLFA) microbial community towards more fungal dominance. 3. Fungal communities promoted by subordinate species were more resistant to drought and maintained higher rates of litter decomposition and soil respiration. These results emphasize the important role of subordinate species in mitigating drought effects on soil ecosystem functions. Reciprocal effects between fungi and subordinate species explain also how subordinate species better resisted to drought conditions. 4. Our results point to a delayed plant-soil feedback following environmental perturbation. Additionally, they extend the diversity insurance hypothesis by showing that more diverse communities not only contain species well adapted to perturbations, but also species with higher impacts on soil microbial communities and related ecosystem functions.

Official source

https://infoscience.epfl.ch/entities/publication/cff40113-4c54-481a-9d5d-de324769c6c5

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Alexandre Buttler, Vincent Eric Jules Jassey, Pierre Rémi Mariotte, Bjorn Jozef Maria Robroek
2015
Journal Articles

Abstract

The subordinate insurance hypothesis suggests that highly diverse communities contain greater numbers of subordinate species than less diverse communities. It has previously been reported that subordinate species can improve grassland productivity during drought, but the underlying mechanisms remain undetermined. 2. Using a combination of subordinate species removal and summer drought, we show that soil processes play a critical role in community resistance to drought. Interestingly, subordinate species drive soil microbial community structure and largely mitigate the effect of drought on grassland soil functioning. Our results highlight subordinate species in shifting the balance within the phospholipid fatty acid (PLFA) microbial community towards more fungal dominance. 3. Fungal communities promoted by subordinate species were more resistant to drought and maintained higher rates of litter decomposition and soil respiration. These results emphasize the important role of subordinate species in mitigating drought effects on soil ecosystem functions. Reciprocal effects between fungi and subordinate species explain also how subordinate species better resisted to drought conditions. 4. Our results point to a delayed plant-soil feedback following environmental perturbation. Additionally, they extend the diversity insurance hypothesis by showing that more diverse communities not only contain species well adapted to perturbations, but also species with higher impacts on soil microbial communities and related ecosystem functions.

Official source

https://infoscience.epfl.ch/entities/publication/cff40113-4c54-481a-9d5d-de324769c6c5

About this result

Ontological neighbourhood

Biology

Ecology: Ecosystems

Related concepts (32)

Soil biology

Soil biology is the study of microbial and faunal activity and ecology in soil. Soil life, soil biota, soil fauna, or edaphon is a collective term that encompasses all organisms that spend a significant portion of their life cycle within a soil profile, or at the soil-litter interface. These organisms include earthworms, nematodes, protozoa, fungi, bacteria, different arthropods, as well as some reptiles (such as snakes), and species of burrowing mammals like gophers, moles and prairie dogs.

Soil

Soil, also commonly referred to as earth, is a mixture of organic matter, minerals, gases, liquids, and organisms that together support life of plants and soil organisms. Some scientific definitions distinguish dirt from soil by restricting the former term specifically to displaced soil. Soil consists of a solid phase of minerals and organic matter (the soil matrix), as well as a porous phase that holds gases (the soil atmosphere) and water (the soil solution). Accordingly, soil is a three-state system of solids, liquids, and gases.

Soil health

Soil health is a state of a soil meeting its range of ecosystem functions as appropriate to its environment. In more colloquial terms, the health of soil arises from favorable interactions of all soil components (living and non-living) that belong together, as in microbiota, plants and animals. It is possible that a soil can be healthy in terms of eco-system functioning but not necessarily serve crop production or human nutrition directly, hence the scientific debate on terms and measurements.

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