Feels Like Home: A Biobased and Biodegradable Plastic Offers a Novel Habitat for Diverse Plant Pathogenic Fungi in Temperate Forest Ecosystems.

Poly(butylene succinate-co-adipate) (PBSA), a biodegradable plastic, is significantly colonized and degraded by soil microbes under natural field conditions, especially by fungal plant pathogens, raising concerns about potential economic losses. This study hypothesizes that the degradation of biodegradable plastics may increase the presence and abundance of plant pathogens by serving as an additional carbon source, ultimately posing a risk to forest ecosystems. We investigated (i) fungal plant pathogens during the exposure of PBSA in European broadleaved and coniferous forests (two forest types), with a specific focus on potential risk to tree health, and (ii) the response of such fungi to environmental factors, including tree species, soil pH, nutrient availability, moisture content, and the physicochemical properties of leaf litter layer.

Metabolic potential of Nitrososphaera-associated clades.

Soil ammonia-oxidizing archaea (AOA) play a crucial role in converting ammonia to nitrite, thereby mobilizing reactive nitrogen species into their soluble form, with a significant impact on nitrogen losses from terrestrial soils. Yet, our knowledge regarding their diversity and functions remains limited. In this study, we reconstructed 97 high-quality AOA metagenome-assembled genomes (MAGs) from 180 soil samples collected in Central Germany during 2014-2019 summers.

A slow-fast trait continuum at the whole community level in relation to land-use intensification.

Organismal functional strategies form a continuum from slow- to fast-growing organisms, in response to common drivers such as resource availability and disturbance. However, whether there is synchronisation of these strategies at the entire community level is unclear. Here, we combine trait data for >2800 above- and belowground taxa from 14 trophic guilds spanning a disturbance and resource availability gradient in German grasslands.

Tree mycorrhizal type regulates leaf and needle microbial communities, affects microbial assembly and co-occurrence network patterns, and influences litter decomposition rates in temperate forest.

Background: Tree mycorrhizal types (arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi and ectomycorrhizal fungi) alter nutrient use traits and leaf physicochemical properties and, thus, affect leaf litter decomposition. However, little is known about how different tree mycorrhizal species affect the microbial diversity, community composition, function, and community assembly processes that govern leaf litter-dwelling microbes during leaf litter decomposition.

Methods: In this study, we investigated the microbial diversity, community dynamics, and community assembly processes of nine temperate tree species using high-resolution molecular technique (Illumina sequencing), including broadleaved arbuscular mycorrhizal, broadleaved ectomycorrhizal, and coniferous ectomycorrhizal tree types, during leaf litter decomposition.

Ecosystem consequences of invertebrate decline.

Human activities cause substantial changes in biodiversity. Despite ongoing concern about the implications of invertebrate decline, few empirical studies have examined the ecosystem consequences of invertebrate biomass loss. Here, we test the responses of six ecosystem services informed by 30 above- and belowground ecosystem variables to three levels of aboveground (i.