Soil Salinity and pH Drive Soil Bacterial Community Composition and Diversity Along a Lateritic Slope in the Avon River Critical Zone Observatory, Western Australia.

ABSTRACT: Soils are crucial in regulating ecosystem processes, such as nutrient cycling, and supporting plant growth. To a large extent, these functions are carried out by highly diverse and dynamic soil microbiomes that are in turn governed by numerous environmental factors including weathering profile and vegetation. In this study, we investigate geophysical and vegetation effects on the microbial communities of iron-rich lateritic soils in the highly weathered landscapes of Western Australia (WA). The study site was a lateritic hillslope in southwestern Australia, where gradual erosion of the duricrust has resulted in the exposure of the different weathering zones. High-throughput amplicon sequencing of the 16S rRNA gene was used to investigate soil bacterial community diversity, composition and

SUBMITTER: O'Brien FJM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6614384 | biostudies-literature | 2019

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature