PRJNA547365
Effects of rainfall addition on archaeal community
Our study was conducted to reveal responses of archaeal communities' composition and diversities to rainfall addition in different periods of growing seasons, and analyze main environmental factors affecting the archaeal community structure. We conducted a field manipulative experiment with five simulated rain addition treatments, including control, rainfall addition (50%, 100%) in early growing season and rainfall addition (50%, 100%) in late growing season. We extracted total DNA from soil samples, and sequenced the V4 region of the 16S rRNA gene on Hiseq platform. Results showed that archaeal communities in the desert was dominated by the phylum of Thaumarchaeota and Euryarchaeota. NMDS and three non-similarity analyses (MRPP, ANOSIM, and Adonis) showed that the archaeal communities composition significantly changed in rainfall addition in late growing season treatments whereas archaeal communities composition remain stable in rainfall addition in early growing season treatments, indicating that archaeal communities had different responses to rainfall in different periods. The relative abundance of the Thaumarchaeota, which associated with the ammoxidation process, significantly increased under 100% rainfall addition in the late growing season condition, suggesting that the nitrification process in desert soil would be stimulated by the rainfall addition. Mantel test results showed that the archaea community structure in desert soil was affected by soil moisture, soil temperature and soil nitrate nitrogen content. Above results suggest that the global precipitation change will have significant impacts on archaeal community structures in desert soils, which may affect the nitrogen cycle in desert ecosystems in the future.