Forest-to-pasture conversion increases the diversity of the phylum Verrucomicrobia in Amazon rainforest soils.
The Amazon rainforest is well known for its rich plant and animal diversity, but its bacterial diversity is virtually unexplored. Due to ongoing and widespread deforestation followed by conversion to agriculture, there is an urgent need to quantify the soil biological diversity within this tropical ecosystem. Given the abundance of the phylum Verrucomicrobia in soils, we targeted this group to examine its response to forest-to-pasture conversion. Both taxonomic and phylogenetic diversities were higher for pasture in comparison to primary and secondary forests. The community composition of Verrucomicrobia in pasture soils was significantly different from those of forests, with a 11.6% increase in the number of sequences belonging to subphylum 3 and a proportional decrease in sequences belonging to the class Spartobacteria. Based on 99% operational taxonomic unit identity, 40% of the sequences have not been detected in previous studies, underscoring the limited knowledge regarding the diversity of microorganisms in tropical ecosystems. The abundance of Verrucomicrobia, measured with quantitative PCR, was strongly correlated with soil C content (r = 0.80, P = 0.0016), indicating their importance in metabolizing plant-derived carbon compounds in soils.
Department of Biology, The University of Texas at Arlington Arlington, TX, USA.
Kshitij
K
Ranjan
Department of Biology, The University of Texas at Arlington Arlington, TX, USA.
Fabiana S
FS
Paula
Institute of Ecology and Evolution, University of Oregon Eugene, OR, USA.
Rebecca C
RC
Mueller
Embrapa Agrobiologia Seropedica, Brazil.
Ederson da C
Eda C
Jesus
Centro de Energia Nuclear na Agricultura, University of Sao Paulo Piracicaba, Brazil.
Karina
K
Cenciani
Institute of Ecology and Evolution, University of Oregon Eugene, OR, USA.
Brendan J M
BJ
Bohannan
Department of Microbiology, University of Massachusetts Amherst, MA, USA.
Klaus
K
Nüsslein
Department of Land, Air and Water Resources, University of California, Davis Davis, CA, USA.
Jorge L M
JL
Rodrigues
biotic homogenization; habitat filtering; land use change; microbial biodiversity; tropical forest