Understory vegetation plays a vital role in regulating soil carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) characteristics due to differences in plant functional traits. Different understory vegetation types have been reported following aerial seeding. While aerial seeding is common in areas with serious soil erosion, few studies have been conducted to investigate changes in soil C and N cycling as affected by un...

Photosynthetic microbial biofilms are an important functional component of rocky intertidal habitats worldwide. The abundance of organisms within these films varies both seasonally and according to vertical emersion gradients. However, the effects of horizontal gradients of wave exposure, which have a key influence on macrobiotic assemblages, have received little attention. Here, we examine the...

Clipping (i.e., harvesting aboveground plant biomass) is common in agriculture and for bioenergy production. However, microbial responses to clipping in the context of climate warming are poorly understood. We investigated the interactive effects of grassland warming and clipping on soil properties and plant and microbial communities, in particular, on microbial functional genes. Clipping alone...

All the regulations that define a maximum concentration of metals in the receiving soil are based on total soil metal concentration. However, the potential toxicity of a heavy metal in the soil depends on its speciation and availability. We studied the effects of heavy metal speciation and availability on soil microorganism activities along a Cu/Zn contamination gradient. Microbial biomass and ...

1. Although dissolved nutrients and the quality of particulate organic matter (POM) influence microbial processes in aquatic systems, these factors have rarely been considered simultaneously. We manipulated dissolved nutrient concentrations and POM type in three contiguous reaches (reference, nitrogen, nitrogen + phosphorus) of a low nutrient, thirdorder stream at Hubbard Brook Experimental For...

Decomposition of litter mixtures generally cannot be predicted from the component species incubated in isolation. Therefore, such non-additive effects of litter mixing on soil C and N dynamics remain poorly understood in terrestrial ecosystems. In this study, litters of Mongolian pine and three dominant understory species and soil were collected from a Mongolian pine plantation in Northeast Chi...

Microbial biomass phosphorus (MBP) is one of the most active forms of phosphorus (P) in soils. MBP plays an important role in the biogeochemical P cycle. To explore MBP distribution and its relationship with other factors, the MBP and rhizosphere soil P concentrations and fractions in six vegetation zones on the eastern slope of Gongga Mountain in SW China were investigated. The MBP distributio...

The variation in bacterial, fungal and total microbial biomass and activity was studied together with the abundance of soil nematodes and microarthropods after the addition of substrates differing in nitrogen availability to a soddy-podzolic soil. The experiments were carried out in microcosms with native and defaunated soil to evaluate stimulatory and suppressive effects of the microfauna on s...

A computer model of biofilm dynamics was adapted to incorporate the activity of an antimicrobial agent on bacterial biofilm. The model was used to evaluate the plausibility of two mechanisms of biofilm antibiotic resistance by qualitative comparison with data from a well-characterized experimental system (H. Anwar, J. L. Strap, and J. W. Costerton, Antimicrob. Agents Chemother. 36:1208-1214, 19...