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Cited by 82Soil Carbon and Nitrogen DynamicsWastewater Treatment and Nitrogen RemovalMicrobial Community Ecology and Physiology

Soil biochar amendment affects the diversity of nosZ transcripts: implications for N2O formation

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Harter, Johannes, El-Hadidi, Mohamed, Huson, Daniel H., Kappler, Andreas, Behrens, Sebastian·2017·Scientific Reports
DOI 10.1038/s41598-017-03282-yPMC PMC5469825
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Abstract

Microbial nitrogen transformation processes such as denitrification represent major sources of the potent greenhouse gas nitrous oxide (N 2 O). Soil biochar amendment has been shown to significantly decrease N 2 O emissions in various soils. However, the effect of biochar on the structure and function of microbial communities that actively perform nitrogen redox transformations has not been studied in detail yet. To analyse the community composition of actively denitrifying and N 2 O-reducing microbial communities, we collected RNA samples at different time points from a soil microcosm experiment conducted under denitrifying conditions and performed Illumina amplicon sequencing targeting nirK, typical nosZ and atypical nosZ mRNA transcripts. Within 10 days, biochar significantly increased the diversity of nirK and typical nosZ transcripts and resulted in taxonomic shifts among the typical nosZ-expressing microbial community. Furthermore, biochar addition led to a significant increase in transcript production among microbial species that are specialized on direct N 2 O reduction from the environment. Our results point towards a potential coupling of biochar-induced N 2 O emission reduction and an increase in microbial N 2 O reduction activity among specific groups of typical and atypical N 2 O reducers. However, experiments with other soils and biochars will be required to verify the transferability of these findings to other soil-biochar systems.

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Authors
Harter, J., El-Hadidi, M., Huson, D. H., Kappler, A., & Behrens, S.
Affiliations
  • University of Tübingen (DE)
  • Nile University (EG)
  • University of Minnesota (US)
Corresponding author
Behrens, Sebastian
ORCID
Venue
Scientific Reports
Publisher
Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Published
2017-06-13
Volume
7
Issue
1
Pages
3338-3338
ISSN
2045-2322 (ISSN-L)
DOI
10.1038/s41598-017-03282-y
PMC
PMC5469825
OpenAlex
W2622519622
Cited by
82
References
5
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FWCI
9.00
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Scientific Reports (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • National University of Singapore (submittedVersion, cc-by)
  • DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion, cc-by-sa)
Funders
  • Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft
  • Argonne National Laboratory
Topics
  • Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Soil Science › Soil Carbon and Nitrogen Dynamics
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Pollution › Wastewater Treatment and Nitrogen Removal
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Ecology › Microbial Community Ecology and Physiology
Keywords
nitrous oxide, denitrification, nirK, nitrous oxide reduction, microbial community structure, soil microcosms, greenhouse gas emissions, RNA sequencing

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