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Forests
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Soil Microbial Communities in Forests: Assessing Impact of Disturbances and...
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Soil Microbial Communities in Forests: Assessing Impact of Disturbances and Climate Change

A special issue of Forests (ISSN 1999-4907). This special issue belongs to the section "Forest Soil".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 May 2024 | Viewed by 1837

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Aurelia Onet

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Guest Editor
Department of Environmental Engineering, Universitatea din Oradea, Oradea, Romania
Interests: forestry; environmental science; environmental protection
Dr. Paola Grenni

E-Mail Website1 Website2
Guest Editor
Water Research Institute, National Research Council (IRSA-CNR), 00010 Rome, Italy
Interests: microbial ecology; bacteria; microbiology; molecular biology; soil analysis; soil ecology; environment
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

A forest's biodiversity is a key factor in its functioning, which results in a multitude of forest ecosystem services and in maintaining its adaptation and resilience to climate change. Forest biodiversity is changing dramatically due to current management practices. The extent of anthropogenic forest conversion to other land uses is continuously increasing over time. In this context, the characterization of the impact of forest disturbance on terrestrial biodiversity is essential. Soil microbial communities are increasingly being used to determine the responses of soils to stress and disturbances. Climate change also significantly impacts the soil biota, with consequences for soil functioning. Microbial communities might thus serve as an indicator of forest ecosystem status. Our understanding on how soil microbial communities will be affected by the disturbances expected from climate change is actually very limited. Therefore, new studies on the responses of microorganisms to various disturbances, including climate change and forest management activities, are needed. This Special Issue is aimed at publishing selected contributions on the effects of forest disturbance and climate change on soil microbial communities and on plant-associated microbiomes. The goal of the current Special Issue is to publish high-quality original scientific articles, paying special (but not exclusive) attention to the following topics:

  • Responses of soil microorganisms to forest disturbances;
  • Influence of tree vegetation on soil microbial communities and their potential as indicators of vegetation shifts due to climate change;
  • Predictions of soil microbial communities' responses to climate change;
  • Influence of forest conversion on the composition and activities of soil microorganisms;
  • Soil microbial communities' successional patterns during forest ecosystem restoration;
  • Influence of soil microbial communities on plant-associated microbiomes in the context of anthropogenic forest disturbance;
  • Influence of harvesting on the diversity and structure of soil bacterial and fungal communities.

Both reviews and original research papers are welcome in this Special Issue.

Dr. Aurelia Onet
Dr. Paola Grenni
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Forests is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • forest soil microorganisms
  • forest disturbance
  • climate change
  • anthropogenic forest conversion
  • microbial community profile
  • microbial metabolic activity
  • diversity and abundance of forest soil biota
  • disturbance responses of soil bacterial and fungal communities
  • soil microbial community and on plant microbiome interactions

Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

16 pages, 2951 KiB  
Article
Short-Term Simulated Warming Changes the Beta Diversity of Bacteria in Taiga Forests’ Permafrost by Altering the Composition of Dominant Bacterial Phyla
by Yunbing Jiang, Song Wu, Libin Yang, Yongzhi Liu, Mingliang Gao and Hongwei Ni
Forests 2024, 15(4), 693; https://doi.org/10.3390/f15040693 - 11 Apr 2024
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Abstract
Permafrost is widely degraded in the context of global warming. The spatial distribution of soil microbes in these cold habitats has received a lot of attention. However, knowledge on the changes in permafrost microbial communities following permafrost thaw is still limited. We used [...] Read more.
Permafrost is widely degraded in the context of global warming. The spatial distribution of soil microbes in these cold habitats has received a lot of attention. However, knowledge on the changes in permafrost microbial communities following permafrost thaw is still limited. We used permafrost soil from a taiga forest for indoor experiments using pristine soil as a control (CK, −2 °C), simulating warming for 15 days at temperatures of 0 °C (T1), 2 °C (T2), and 4 °C (T3). Amplicons of the hypervariable V4 region of the bacterial 16S rRNA gene were sequenced to identify bacterial communities present in the soils of pristine and warming treatments. Warming increased the average relative abundance of Proteobacteria (5.71%) and decreased that of Actinobacteriota (7.82%). The Beta diversity changed (p = 0.001) and significantly correlated with the pH, microbial biomass carbon (MBC), and available potassium (AK) of the soil (p < 0.05). Warming further increased the Alpha diversity (Simpson index), changing the functional pathways of the bacterial communities, whereby secondary functional pathways produced significant correlations with bacterial phyla (p < 0.05). Combined, the results indicated that short-term warming altered the Beta diversity of soil bacteria in a taiga forest’s permafrost soil by decreasing the abundance of Actinobacteria and increasing that of Ascomycetes, while pH, MBC, and AK were identified as the soil factors influencing the structure and diversity of the bacterial communities. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soil Microbial Communities in Forests: Assessing Impact of Disturbances and Climate Change)
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16 pages, 1616 KiB  
Article
Soil Properties and Forest Decline in the North-Western Part of Romania
by Aurelia Onet, Roxana Vidican, Carmen Ghergheles, Larisa Corcoz, Vlad Stoian, Cristian Onet and Alin Cristian Teusdea
Forests 2024, 15(1), 124; https://doi.org/10.3390/f15010124 - 08 Jan 2024
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Abstract
The paper presents the study of the soil quality and health expressed by the chemical and biological properties in a research field placed at Varciorog, Bihor County, Romania. The soil samples were collected from 3 soil variants in March 2023. In each soil [...] Read more.
The paper presents the study of the soil quality and health expressed by the chemical and biological properties in a research field placed at Varciorog, Bihor County, Romania. The soil samples were collected from 3 soil variants in March 2023. In each soil variant, some soil chemical parameters and the abundance of bacteria were determined. The frequency and intensity of colonization, along with arbuscules and vesicles, were scored to determine the mycorrhizal potential of each soil. The community-level physiological profile was used to determine the functional microbiome and its ability to decompose a specific set of substrates. In the control variant (CTRL), which is a functional forest cultivated with beech in a proportion of 90%, the soil properties were compared with those determined from Site 1 (a declined mixed forest) and from Site 2 (chestnut forest in a stage of complete drying). The data were statistically processed with a one-way ANOVA test, followed by the Duncan post-hoc test, which revealed significant variation in the potential of microbial functional communities across the analyzed sites. Also, the soil parameters that significantly varied in the 3 soil variants were bacterial number, pH, humus, exchangeable aluminum, coarse sand, dust, and fine sand. The Pearson correlation was computed to study the links between bacterial numbers and chemical parameters. The results showed strong correlations between most of the studied soil properties. The Ecoplates approach to soil functional microbiome highlighted various differences between the microbial communities of the three tested sites. Mycorrhizal colonization shows different potentials for symbiosis formation. The peak of mycorrhizal colonization was in declined forest, with 43.36% colonization frequency and 24.56% intensity. Arbuscules reached 11.36% in declined forest, while in control and decayed sites, the indicator was under 4%. Vesicles are more associated with control and decayed forests, with values of presence over 1.30%. As an indicator of microbial general activity, the sum of recorded activities was higher in declined and decayed forests. At these sites, the activity of the functional microbiome was amplified. The decline process activates a higher diversity of functional groups and is associated with a larger area of substrate decomposition capacity, which indicates a more extensive range of microbial functions related to breaking down organic matter. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soil Microbial Communities in Forests: Assessing Impact of Disturbances and Climate Change)
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