Effects of plastic film mulching on soil microbial carbon metabolic activity and functional diversity at different maize growth stages in cool, semi-arid regions

Meng Kong; Ming-Jing Huang; Zhi-Xian Zhang; Jiang Long; Kadambot H M Siddique; Dong-Mei Zhang

doi:10.3389/fmicb.2024.1492149

Effects of plastic film mulching on soil microbial carbon metabolic activity and functional diversity at different maize growth stages in cool, semi-arid regions

Front Microbiol. 2024 Oct 28:15:1492149. doi: 10.3389/fmicb.2024.1492149. eCollection 2024.

Authors

Meng Kong^{1

2}, Ming-Jing Huang^{1

2}, Zhi-Xian Zhang^{1

2}, Jiang Long^{1

2}, Kadambot H M Siddique³, Dong-Mei Zhang^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ Shanxi Province Key Laboratory of Sustainable Dryland Agriculture, Shanxi Institute of Sustainable Dryland Agriculture, Shanxi Agricultural University, Taiyuan, China.
² Key Laboratory of Sustainable Dryland Agriculture (Co-construction by Ministry of Agriculture and Rural Affairs and Shanxi Province), Shanxi Agricultural University, Taiyuan, China.
³ Institute of Agriculture, The University of Western Australia, Perth, WA, Australia.

Abstract

Introduction: Plastic film mulching has been widely used to enhance soil hydrothermal conditions and increase crop yields in cool, semi-arid areas. However, its impact on soil microbial carbon metabolic activity and functional diversity during plant growth remains unclear despite their important roles in nutrient cycling and soil quality evaluation.

Methods: This study used the Biolog EcoPlate technique to investigate the dynamics and driving factors of soil microbial carbon metabolic activity and functional diversity at different maize growth stages following plastic film mulching.

Results and discussion: The results revealed that film mulching significantly increased microbial carbon metabolic activities [represented by average well color development (AWCD)] by 300% at the seedling stage and by 26.8% at maturity but decreased it by 47.4% at the flowering stage compared to the control (without mulching). A similar trend was observed for the microbial functional diversity index. Redundancy analysis identified soil moisture (SM), soil temperature (ST), dissolved organic carbon (DOC), microbial biomass carbon (MBC), and bacteria amounts as the primary factors influencing changes in soil microbial carbon source utilization. The mulch treatment significantly increased SM at all growth stages, while its warming effect disappeared at the flowering stage. Soil DOC, MBC, and bacterial populations were notably higher under mulching at the seedling and maturity stages but lower at the flowering stage. Pearson correlation analysis showed that changes in SM, ST, DOC, MBC, and bacterial populations positively correlated with the utilization of all carbon source classes, AWCD, and functional diversity indexes after film mulching. Furthermore, maize grain yield and water use efficiency increased by 142 and 129%, respectively, following film mulching. In conclusion, plastic film mulching enhanced soil microbial carbon metabolic activity and functional diversity at the seedling and maturity stages, improving crop yields in cool, semi-arid areas. Furthermore, the decrease in soil carbon metabolic capacity at flowering stage highlights that supplementing soil carbon sources should be considered after continuous film mulching to sustain or enhance farmland productivity and soil quality.

Keywords: crop yield; plant growth; soil carbon; soil microbial community; soil quality.

Grants and funding

The author(s) declare that financial support was received for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article. This research was funded by Fundamental Research Program of Shanxi Province (No. 202203021212473), National Key Research and Development Program of China (2021YFD1901101), the Science and Technology Major Project of Shanxi Province (202101140601026), and the Doctoral Scientific Research Start-up Foundation of Shanxi Agricultural University (2021BQ47).