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Plant community, geographic distance and abiotic factors play different roles in predicting AMF biogeography at the regional scale in northern China
Author(s) -
Xu Tianle,
Veresoglou Stavros D.,
Chen Yongliang,
Rillig Matthias C.,
Xiang Dan,
Ondřej Daniel,
Hao Zhipeng,
Liu Lei,
Deng Ye,
Hu Yajun,
Chen Weiping,
Wang Juntao,
He Jizheng,
Chen Baodong
Publication year - 2016
Publication title -
environmental microbiology reports
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 1.229
H-Index - 69
ISSN - 1758-2229
DOI - 10.1111/1758-2229.12485
Subject(s) - biogeography , species richness , abiotic component , ecology , transect , steppe , geographical distance , biology , insular biogeography , phylogenetic diversity , plant community , community structure , vegetation (pathology) , community , ecosystem , phylogenetic tree , beta diversity , biodiversity , terrestrial ecosystem , medicine , population , biochemistry , demography , pathology , sociology , gene
Summary Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) are ubiquitous mutualists of terrestrial plants and play key roles in regulating various ecosystem processes, but little is known about AMF biogeography at regional scale. This study aims at exploring the key predictors of AMF communities across a 5000‐km transect in northern China. We determined the soil AMF species richness and community composition at 47 sites representative of four vegetation types (meadow steppe, typical steppe, desert steppe and desert) and related them to plant community characteristics, abiotic factors and geographic distance. The results showed that soil pH was the strongest predictor of AMF richness and phylogenetic diversity. However, abiotic factors only have a low predictive effect on AMF community composition or phylogenetic patterns. By contrast, we found a significant relationship between community composition of AMF and plants, which was a surprising result given the extent of heterogeneity in the plant community across this transect. Moreover, the geographic distance predominantly explained the AMF phylogenetic structure, implying that history evolutionary may play a role in shaping AMF biogeographic patterns. This study highlighted the different roles of main factors in predicting AMF biogeography, and bridge landscape‐scale studies to more recent global‐scale efforts.