RESEARCH ARTICLE Factors affecting soil microbial biomass and functional diversity with the application of organic amendments in three contrasting cropland soils during a field experiment Ling Li1, Minggang Xu1*, Mohammad Eyakub Ali1, Wenju Zhang1, Yinghua Duan1, Dongchu Li2 a1111111111 1 National Engineering Laboratory for Improving Quality of Arable Land, Institute of Agricultural Resources and Regional Planning, Chinese Academy of Agricultural Sciences, Beijing, China, 2 Qiyang Agro-ecosystem a1111111111 of National Field Experimental Station, Hunan, China a1111111111 a1111111111 *
[email protected] a1111111111 Abstract The effects of soil type and organic material quality on the microbial biomass and functional OPEN ACCESS diversity of cropland soils were studied in a transplant experiment in the same climate during Citation: Li L, Xu M, Eyakub Ali M, Zhang W, Duan a 1-year field experiment. Six organic materials (WS: wheat straw, CS: corn straw, WR: Y, Li D (2018) Factors affecting soil microbial biomass and functional diversity with the wheat root, CR: corn root, PM: pig manure, CM: cattle manure), and three contrasting soils application of organic amendments in three (Ferralic Cambisol, Calcaric Cambisol and Luvic Phaeozem) were chosen. At two time contrasting cropland soils during a field points (at the end of the 1st and 12th months), soil microbial biomass carbon (C) and nitro- experiment. PLoS ONE 13(9): e0203812. https:// gen (N) (MBC and MBN) and Biolog Ecoplate substrate use patterns were determined, and doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0203812 the average well color development and the microbial functional diversity indices (Shannon, Editor: Jingdong Mao, Old Dominion University, Simpson and McIntosh indices) were calculated.