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Acta Prataculturae Sinica ›› 2020, Vol. 29 ›› Issue (12): 150-160.DOI: 10.11686/cyxb2020186

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Correlations between arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi and distribution of main grassland types in Ningxia

Zhan-jun WANG1(), Kun MA2,3(), Hui-zhen CUI3, Guang-wen LI3, Hong-qian YU1, Qi JIANG1   

  1. 1.Institute of Desertification Control,Ningxia Academy of Agricultural and Forestry Sciences,Yinchuan 750001,China
    2.Cultivation Base of State Key Laboratory of Land Degradation and Ecological Restoration,in Northwest of China,Ningxia University,Yinchuan 750021,China
    3.Agricultural College,Ningxia University,Yinchuan 750021,China
  • Received:2020-04-21 Revised:2020-06-01 Online:2020-12-28 Published:2020-12-28
  • Contact: Kun MA

Abstract:

The aim of this study was to analyze the distribution and types of soil arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi in different grassland types in Ningxia. We selected areas with five vegetation types on the desert steppe (Pennisetum centrasiaticum+Glycyrrhiza uralensis, Stipa breviflora+Lespedeza potaninii+Artemisia scoparia, Artemisia arenaria, and S. breviflora) and dry steppe (Stipa bungeana+Leymus secalinus+Artemisia gansuensis). These areas have been fenced since 2003. The soil AM fungi were analyzed by fatty acid fingerprinting and subjected to high-throughput sequencing using the Illumina platform. The correlations between soil AM fungal diversity and community composition, characteristics of grassland vegetation community, and soil environmental factors were determined. The results showed that there were significant differences in the soil AM fungal biomass characterized by neutral lipid fatty acids (16:1ω5c) in the steppe grassland soil of S. bungeana+L. secalinus+A. gansuensis, compared with the desert steppe soils of P. centrasiaticum+G. uralensis, S. breviflora+L. potaninii+A. scoparia, A. arenaria, and S. breviflora P<0.01). The values of the Shannon-Wiener index, Simpson’s index, Chao1 index, and Pielou index were higher for AM fungi in soil of S. bungeana+L. secalinus+A. gansuensis on the dry steppe than for soil AM fungi in soil from vegetation types on desert steppe (P<0.05). We identified one phylum, three classes, four orders, seven families, eight genera, and 50 species of AM fungi. Glomus and Paraglomus were the dominant genera of AM fungi. Under the different classification levels, there were significant differences in the relative abundance of 11 kinds of AM fungi between the dry steppe and desert steppe soils. The results of nonmetric multidimensional scaling analysis showed that the spatial distribution of the soil AM fungal communities differed between the dry steppe and the desert steppe, and the AM fungal communities on the dry steppe were more diverse than those on the desert steppe. The AM fungal Shannon-Wiener index and Chao1 index were significantly positively correlated with the vegetation Shannon-Wiener index, species, total biomass, and the vegetation importance value, as determined by Pearson’s correlation analyses. The relative abundance of Claroideoglomus and Paraglomus was positively and significantly correlated with the contents of soil total nitrogen, total phosphorus, available nitrogen, organic matter, and available potassium. Our results indicate that differences in soil physical and chemical properties and the characteristics of vegetation types caused by rainfall distribution and elevation are the main factors affecting the diversity of soil AM fungi and the relative abundance of dominant soil AM genera in different grassland types.

Key words: desert steppe, dry steppe, AM fungi, community structure, vegetation