Soil microbial communities' compositional and functional response to climate change and different three species

Microbial communities and their functionality are affected by climate change, which consequently impacts the functionality of soil biogeochemical cycles and in turn the persistence of individual tree species. Despite their importance for forest ecosystems, few studies have investigated the impacts of multiple, concurrent elements of climate change on microbial communities under tree species with contrasting drought tolerance and different biogeographic origins.

In our study, we investigated how soil microbial communities of different native and non-native tree species responded to warming and warming associated with drought. The experiment was located in Switzerland and included three forest sites with different climatic and environmental characteristics where temperature and precipitation have been manipulated since 2022. Soil microbial communities were assessed using DNA metabarcoding, and extracellular enzyme activities were assessed alongside environmental variables and soil nutrient availability.

Preliminary results showed that strong differences across sites shape microbial community composition and modulate their responses to the experimental climate treatments. The strongest effects of climate manipulations were found at the warmest and driest site. Soil microbial community composition responses to the different climate change treatments further among the tree species. In addition to microbial community composition, microbial functioning, as assessed via enzymatic activities, also differed across sites and generally decreased with the climate treatments, suggesting that biogeochemical cycles are likely to change in the future.

Our research aimed to clarify the possible consequences of warming and drought on forest microbiomes and consequently soil biogeochemical cycles under global change. This will support the development of climate change mitigation strategies to maintain forest ecosystem functionality and to choose future tree species able to resist climatic stresses.