title: Soil microbial data from coal mine undergoing restoration with Subsoil Mulch treated soil
design: Extraction of metagenomics DNA was performed using QIAGEN DNeasy Powersoil Kit following the manufacturer's instructions with two exceptions. First, 0.5 g of soil was used for all samples as opposed to the recommended 0.25 g. Second, following 10 minutes of vortexing, samples were centrifuged for 3 minutes rather than 30 seconds. These changes were made to increase the yield from the samples. Extractions were performed by block. The success of the extraction was checked using NanoDrop 1000 spectrophotometer (Thermo Scientific) and gel electrophoresis. Extracted samples were stored at -20C. Next-Generation Sequencing was performed using Illumina MiSeq platform with Paired-End chemistry, utilising Illumina's Nextera XT Indexing. The bacterial and archaeal primer was 16S: 27F-519R (V1-V3) (forward sequence: AGAGTTTGATCMTGGCTCAG, reverse sequence: GWATTACCGCGGCKGCTG), and the fungal primer was ITS: 1F-2R (forward sequence: CTTGGTCATTTAGAGGAAGTAA, reverse sequence: GCTGCGTTCTTCATCGATGC).