Miao Youzhi, Wang Wei, Xu Huanhuan, Xia Yanwei, Gong Qingxin, Xu Zhihui, Zhang Nan, Xun Weibing, Shen Qirong, Zhang Ruifu
Jiangsu Provincial Key Lab of Solid Organic Waste Utilization, Jiangsu Collaborative Innovation Center of Solid Organic Wastes, Key Lab of Organic-Based Fertilizers of China, Educational Ministry Engineering Center of Resource-Saving Fertilizers, Nanjing Agricultural University, Nanjing, China.
Genome Biol. 2025 Feb 3;26(1):20. doi: 10.1186/s13059-025-03486-w.
Plant residue microbial decomposition, subject to significant environmental regulation, represents a crucial ecological process shaping and cycling the largest terrestrial soil organic carbon pool. However, the fundamental understanding of the functional dynamics and interactions between the principal participants, fungi and bacteria, in natural habitats remains limited.
In this study, the evolution of fungal and bacterial communities and their functional interactions were elucidated during the degradation of complexity-gradient plant residues. The results reveal that with increasing residue complexity, fungi exhibit heightened adaptability, while bacterial richness declines sharply. The differential functional evolution of fungi and bacteria is driven by residue complexity but follows distinct trajectories. Fundamentally, fungi evolve towards promoting plant residue degradation and so consistently act as the dominant decomposers. Conversely, bacteria predominantly increase expression of genes of glycosidases to exploit fungal degradation products, thereby consistently acting as exploiters. The presence of fungi enables and endures bacterial exploitation.
This study introduces a novel framework of fungal decomposers and bacterial exploiters during plant residue microbial decomposition, advancing our comprehensive understanding of microbial processes governing the organic carbon cycling.
植物残体的微生物分解受显著的环境调控，是塑造和循环最大陆地土壤有机碳库的关键生态过程。然而，对于自然栖息地中主要参与者真菌和细菌之间的功能动态及相互作用的基本理解仍然有限。
在本研究中，阐明了复杂梯度植物残体降解过程中真菌和细菌群落的演变及其功能相互作用。结果表明，随着残体复杂性增加，真菌表现出更高的适应性，而细菌丰富度急剧下降。真菌和细菌的不同功能演变由残体复杂性驱动，但遵循不同轨迹。从根本上说，真菌朝着促进植物残体降解的方向进化，因此始终作为主要分解者发挥作用。相反，细菌主要增加糖苷酶基因的表达以利用真菌降解产物，从而始终作为利用者发挥作用。真菌的存在使细菌能够进行并耐受利用。
本研究引入了植物残体微生物分解过程中真菌分解者和细菌利用者的新框架，推进了我们对控制有机碳循环的微生物过程的全面理解。
