Arid Zone Research ›› 2023, Vol. 40 ›› Issue (8): 1358-1368.doi: 10.13866/j.azr.2023.08.16

• Ecology and Environment • Previous Articles    

Study on bacterial community structure and influencing factors in the northern margin of the Shanshan Kumtag Desert

LI Juan1(),LIU Yang2,3,LIU Guangxiu2,3,CHENG Liang1,GUO Qingyun1,ZHANG Wei2,3,ZHANG Gaosen2,3()   

  1. 1. Institute of Plant Protection, Qinghai Academy of Agriculture and Forestry Science, Qinghai University, Xining 810016, Qinghai, China
    2. Northwest Institute of Eco-Environment and Resources, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou 730000, Gansu, China
    3. Key Laboratory of Extreme Environmental Microbial Resources and Engineering, Lanzhou 730000, Gansu, China
  • Received:2023-01-18 Revised:2023-04-13 Online:2023-08-15 Published:2023-08-24

Abstract:

The Shanshan Kumtag Desert, which is connected to the city, contains rich and unique microbial resources. To explore the microbial community structure and its relationship with environmental factors in the Shanshan Kumtag Desert, surface (0-5 cm) and deep (45-50 cm) layer sand samples were collected from four points along the northern margin of the desert. Subsequently, the collected samples were analyzed to determine the water content (WC), pH, total carbon (TC), total nitrogen (TN), total organic carbon (TOC), and electrical conductivity. High-throughput sequencing technology was used to analyze the bacterial community structure of the sand samples, and Spearman correlation was used to analyze the correlation between environmental factors and the bacterial community structure. The results showed that the collected sand samples were alkaline, and the dominant bacterial phyla were Actinobacteria, Firmicutes, Proteobacteria, and Bacteroidetes. Among these, the dominant genera were unclassified_f__Micrococcaceae, Bacillus, Sphingomonas, Escherichia-Shigella, and Microbacterium. Significant differences in the bacterial community structure were observed among the different points along the northern margin of the Shanshan Kumtag Desert (P < 0.05). However, no significant difference in species diversity was observed between the surface and deep layer samples. Furthermore, WC, TC, TN, and pH significantly affected the bacterial community structure in the surface samples (P < 0.05), while TOC significantly affected the bacterial community structure in the deep samples (P < 0.05). This study provides a theoretical basis for exploring microbial resources in the Shanshan Kumtag Desert and similar habitats.

Key words: Shanshan Kumtag Desert, high-throughput sequencing, bacterial community structure, environmental factors, physicochemical property