Shifts in community structure and function of ammonia-oxidizing archaea in biological soil crusts along a revegetation chronosequence in the Tengger Desert

摘要

Metagenomic studies have demonstrated the existence of ammonia-oxidizing archaea (AOA) and revealed they are respon-sible for ammoxidation in some extreme environments. However, the changes in compositional structure and ammonia-ox-idation capacity of AOA communities in biological soil crusts (BSCs) of desert ecosystems remain poorly understood. Here, we utilized Illumina MiSeq sequencing and microbial functional gene array (GeoChip 5.0) to assess the above changes along a 51-year revegetation chronosequence in the Tengger Desert, China. The results showed a significant dif-ference in AOA-community richness between 5-year-old BSCs and older ones. The most dominant phylum during BSC development was Crenarchaeota, and the corresponding species were ammonia-oxidizing_Crenarchaeote and environmen-tal_samples_Crenarchaeota. Network analysis revealed that the positive correlations among dominant taxa increased, and their cooperation was reinforced in AOA communities during BSC succession. Redundancy analysis showed that the dom-inant factor influencing the change in AOA-community structure was soil texture. GeoChip 5.0 indicated that the amoA gene abundances of AOA and ammonia-oxidizing bacteria (AOB) were basically the same, demonstrating that AOA and AOB played an equally important role during BSCs development. Our study of the long-term succession of BSC demon-strated a persistent response of AOA communities to revegetation development in desert ecosystems.