Seasonal variation of microbial populations and biomass in Tatachia grassland soils of Taiwan

Shine Tsern Cho, Shu Hsien Tsai, Anita Ravindran, Ammaiyappan Selvam, Shang Shyng Yang*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalJournal articlepeer-review

19 Citations (Scopus)

Abstract

To investigate the seasonal variations of microbial ecology in grassland of Tatachia forest, soil properties, microbial populations, microbial biomass, and 16S rDNA clone library analysis were determined. The soil had temperatures 6.6-18.4°C, pH 3.6-5.1, total organic carbon 1.11-10.68%, total nitrogen 0.18-0.78%, and C/N ratios 3.46-20.55. Each gram of dry soil contained bacteria, actinomycetes, fungi, cellulolytic, phosphate-solubilizing microbes, and nitrogen-fixing microbes 4.54 × 104 to 3.79 × 107, 3.43 × 102 to 2.17 × 105, 5.74 × 103 to 3.76 × 106, 1.97 × 103 to 1.34 × 106, 8.49 × 102 to 5.59 × 105, and 3.86 × 102 to 3.75 × 105 CFU, respectively. Each gram of soil contained 117-2,482 μg of microbial biomass carbon, 23-216 μg of microbial biomass nitrogen and 9-29 μg of DNA. The microbial populations, microbial biomass, and DNA decreased stepwise with the depth of soil, and they had low values in winter seasons. The microbial populations, microbial biomass carbon, microbial biomass nitrogen, and DNA at the BW2 horizon were 8.42-17.84, 19.26-64.40, 16.84-61.11, and 31.03-46.26% of those at the O horizon, respectively. When analyzing 16S rDNA library, members of Proteobacteria, Acidobacteria, Actinobacteria, Bacteroidetes, Chloroflexi, Firmicutes, candidate division TM1, candidate division TM7, Gammatimonadetes, and Verrucomicrobia were identified. Members of Proteobacteria (44.4%) and Acidobacteria (33.3%) dominated the clone libraries. Within the phylum Proteobacteria, α-, β, and γ-Proteobacteria were most numerous, followed by δ-Proteobacteria.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)255-272
Number of pages18
JournalEnvironmental Geochemistry and Health
Volume30
Issue number3
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Jun 2008

Scopus Subject Areas

  • Environmental Engineering
  • Environmental Chemistry
  • Water Science and Technology
  • General Environmental Science
  • Geochemistry and Petrology

User-Defined Keywords

  • 16S rDNA clone library
  • Grassland
  • Microbial biomass carbon and nitrogen
  • Microbial ecology
  • PCR
  • Profile
  • Seasonal variation

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