Max Planck Institute for Terrestrial Microbiology, 35043 Marburg, Germany. Institute of Soil Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 210008 Nanjing, China.
Environ Microbiol Rep. 2011 Dec;3(6):738-43. doi: 10.1111/j.1758-2229.2011.00292.x. Epub 2011 Sep 27.
Rice is the staple food for more than half of the world's growing population. While the area planted to wetland rice is expected to increase further, virtually nothing is known about the long-term development of the respective microbial communities, and how these might influence biogeochemistry. Focusing on methane oxidizing bacteria, we studied a chronosequence of paddy fields in China aged 50-2000 years. Potential methanotrophic activity increased substantially with age of soil. Community composition was relatively similar in all fields. However, growth and activity of one particular subgroup of methanotrophs correlated to soil age suggesting an intricate abiotic control on methanotrophs evolving with time. Our results demonstrate that continuous rice agriculture does not only shape the microbial community, but also modifies the micro-environment in a way enabling faster growth and higher activity of selected populations.
水稻是世界上一半以上人口的主食。虽然预计湿地稻种植面积将进一步增加，但对于各自微生物群落的长期发展以及这些微生物群落如何影响生物地球化学几乎一无所知。本研究聚焦于甲烷氧化菌，对中国的一组种植年限为 50-2000 年的稻田进行了研究。潜在的甲烷氧化活性随着土壤年龄的增加而显著增加。所有稻田的群落组成都相对相似。然而，特定甲烷氧化菌亚群的生长和活性与土壤年龄相关，这表明随着时间的推移，甲烷氧化菌受到复杂的非生物控制。我们的研究结果表明，持续的水稻农业不仅塑造了微生物群落，还以一种使特定种群更快生长和更高活性的方式改变了微环境。
