Responses of soil nitrogen fixation to Spartina alterniflora invasion and nitrogen addition in a Chinese salt marsh

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Abstract

Biological nitrogen fixation (BNF) is the major natural process of nitrogen (N) input to ecosystems. To understand how plant invasion and N enrichment affect BNF, we compared soil N-fixation rates and N-fixing microbes (NFM) of an invasive Spartina alterniflora community and a native Phragmites australis community in the Yangtze River estuary, with and without N addition. Our results indicated that plant invasion relative to N enrichment had a greater influence on BNF. At each N level, the S. alterniflora community had a higher soil N-fixation rate but a lower diversity of the nifH gene in comparison with the native community. The S. alterniflora community with N addition had the highest soil N-fixation rate and the nifH gene abundance across all treatments. Our results suggest that S. alterniflora invasion can increase soil N fixation in the high N-loading estuarine ecosystem, and thus may further mediate soil N availability.

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Huang, J., Xu, X., Wang, M., Nie, M., Qiu, S., Wang, Q., … Li, B. (2016). Responses of soil nitrogen fixation to Spartina alterniflora invasion and nitrogen addition in a Chinese salt marsh. Scientific Reports, 6. https://doi.org/10.1038/srep20384

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