PAPER: Bacteria as Emerging Indicators of Soil ...

Bacteria as Emerging Indicators of Soil Condition

December 2016

Hermans SM, Buckley HL, Case BS, Curran-Cournane F, Taylor M, Lear G 2017. Bacteria as Emerging Indicators of Soil Condition. Appl Environ Microbiol 83(1).

ABSTRACT

Bacterial communities are important for the health and productivity of soil ecosystems and have great potential as novel indicators of environmental perturbations. To assess how they are affected by anthropogenic activity and to determine their ability to provide alternative metrics of environmental health, we sought to define which soil variables bacteria respond to across multiple soil types and land uses.

KEYWORDS

Bacteria; Biodiversity; Carbon; Climate; Ecosystem; Hydrogen-Ion Concentration; Microbial Consortia; Nitrogen; Phosphorus; Phylogeny; RNA, Ribosomal, 16S; Soil; Soil Microbiology