Abstract
Current studies show that multispecies forests are beneficial regarding biodiversity and ecosystem functionality. However, there are only little efforts to understand the ecological mechanisms behind these advantages of multispecies forests. Bacteria are among the key plant growth-promoting microorganisms that support tree growth and fitness. Thus, we investigated links between bacterial communities, their functionality and root trait dispersion within four major European forest types comprising multispecies and monospecific plots. Bacterial diversity revealed no major changes across the root functional dispersion gradient. In contrast, predicted gene profiles linked to plant growth activities suggest an increasing bacterial functionality from monospecific to multispecies forest. In multispecies forest plots, the bacterial functionality linked to plant growth activities declined with the increasing functional dispersion of the roots. Our findings indicate that enriched abundant bacterial operational taxonomic units are decoupled from bacterial functionality. We also found direct effects of tree species identity on bacterial community composition but no significant relations with root functional dispersion. Additionally, bacterial network analyses indicated that multispecies forests have a higher complexity in their bacterial communities, which points towards more stable forest systems with greater functionality. We identified a potential of root dispersion to facilitate bacterial interactions and consequently, plant growth activities.
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Claims 7
Claim · model-written summary
Bacterial diversity showed no major change across the root functional dispersion gradient.
Verbatim
e0“Bacterial diversity revealed no major changes across the root functional dispersion gradient.”
e1“tree growth and fitness”
Claim · model-written summary
Predicted bacterial plant-growth functionality increased from monospecific to multispecies forest.
Verbatim
e0“predicted gene profiles linked to plant growth activities suggest an increasing bacterial functionality from monospecific to multispecies forest.”
e1“tree growth and fitness”
e2“Bacteria are among the key plant growth-promoting microorganisms”
Claim · model-written summary
In multispecies forest plots, predicted bacterial plant-growth functionality declined with increasing root functional dispersion.
Verbatim
e0“In multispecies forest plots, the bacterial functionality linked to plant growth activities declined with the increasing functional dispersion of the roots.”
e1“tree growth and fitness”
e2“Bacteria are among the key plant growth-promoting microorganisms”
Claim · model-written summary
Abundant bacterial operational taxonomic units were decoupled from bacterial functionality.
Not reportedDirection
Verbatim
e0“enriched abundant bacterial operational taxonomic units are decoupled from bacterial functionality.”
e1“tree growth and fitness”
e2“Bacteria are among the key plant growth-promoting microorganisms”
Claim · model-written summary
Tree species identity directly affected bacterial community composition.
Not reportedDirection
Verbatim
e0“direct effects of tree species identity on bacterial community composition”
e1“Bacteria are among the key plant growth-promoting microorganisms”
Claim · model-written summary
Bacterial community composition had no significant relation to root functional dispersion.
Verbatim
e0“no significant relations with root functional dispersion.”
e1“bacterial community composition”
e2“tree growth and fitness”
e3“Bacteria are among the key plant growth-promoting microorganisms”
Claim · model-written summary
Multispecies forests had more complex bacterial community networks.
Verbatim
e0“multispecies forests have a higher complexity in their bacterial communities”
e1“tree growth and fitness”
e2“Bacteria are among the key plant growth-promoting microorganisms”