Tomato plants rather than fertilizers drive microbial community structure in horticultural growing media

Research output: Journal contributionsJournal articlesResearchpeer-review

Authors

  • Oliver Grunert
  • Ana Alejandra Robles Aguilar
  • Emma Hernandez-Sanabria
  • Sylvia Schrey
  • Dirk Reheul
  • Marie-Christine Van Labeke
  • Siegfried E. Vlaeminck
  • Tom G. L. Vandekerckhove
  • Mohamed Mysara
  • Pieter Monsieurs
  • Victoria Temperton
  • Nico Boon
  • Nicolai Jablonowski
Synthetic fertilizer production is associated with a high environmental footprint, as compounds typically dissolve rapidly leaching emissions to the atmosphere or surface waters. We tested two recovered nutrients with slower release patterns, as promising alternatives for synthetic fertilizers: struvite and a commercially available organic fertilizer. Using these fertilizers as nitrogen source, we conducted a rhizotron experiment to test their effect on plant performance and nutrient recovery in juvenile tomato plants. Plant performance was significantly improved when organic fertilizer was provided, promoting higher shoot biomass. Since the microbial community influences plant nitrogen availability, we characterized the root-associated microbial community structure and functionality. Analyses revealed distinct root microbial community structure when different fertilizers were supplied. However, plant presence significantly increased the similarity of the microbial community over time, regardless of fertilization. Additionally, the presence of the plant significantly reduced the potential ammonia oxidation rates, implying a possible role of the rhizosheath microbiome or nitrification inhibition by the plant. Our results indicate that nitrifying community members are impacted by the type of fertilizer used, while tomato plants influenced the potential ammonia-oxidizing activity of nitrogen-related rhizospheric microbial communities. These novel insights on interactions between recovered fertilizers, plant and associated microbes can contribute to develop sustainable crop production systems.
Original languageEnglish
Article number9561
JournalScientific Reports
Volume9
Issue number1
Number of pages15
ISSN2045-2322
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 01.12.2019

Bibliographical note

Publisher Copyright:
© 2019, The Author(s).

Documents

DOI

Recently viewed

Publications

  1. Exports and Productivity Growth
  2. Pollination mitigates cucumber yield gaps more than pesticide and fertilizer use in tropical smallholder gardens
  3. Enhancing the transformative potential of sustainability innovations
  4. Form
  5. What determines PCB concentrations in soils in rural and urban areas?
  6. Publicum
  7. Polizei und Rassismus: Konsolidierung eines neuen Forschungsbereiches?
  8. How Music Touches
  9. From the editors
  10. Sources of nitrogen heterocyclic PAHs (N-HETs) along a riverine course
  11. The ABCs of Inclusive English Teacher Education
  12. Digital health literacy and subjective wellbeing in the context of COVID-19
  13. Role of SiC in grain refinement of aluminum-free Mg-Zn alloys
  14. The bicultural phenomenon
  15. Do learner characteristics moderate the seductive-details-effect?
  16. Dada Data
  17. Lucia Moholy’s idle hands
  18. Change-Beneficial Process Architectures and the Human as a Change Enabler
  19. Postretirement Career Planning
  20. Loving the mess
  21. The role of expert feedback in the development of pre-service teachers’ professional vision of classroom management in an online blended learning environment
  22. How do investors react to problematic social issues in organisations?
  23. On inhomogeneous Bernoulli convolutions and random power series
  24. Aufsätze im SMS-Stil?
  25. Das Interface der Selbstverborgenheit
  26. Almost there: On the importance of a comprehensive entrepreneurial ecosystem for developing sustainable urban food forest enterprises
  27. Balibar/Wallerstein's "Race, nation, class"
  28. 'Climate neutral' is a lie - abandon it as a goal