Abstract
Aims
Soil pH critically influences microbial community diversity and structure, characterized by intricate network interactions among community members. However, the precise relationship between soil pH and microbial network complexity and stability remains inadequately explored.
Methods
We analyzed soil samples from 246 agricultural fields spanning 107,200 km2 in eastern China, employing a novel moving-window approach to examine key topological attributes of microbial networks across a pH gradient.
Results
Neutral pH (7.0) emerged as a critical threshold for microbial network dynamics. At this pH, networks exhibited maximal complexity, characterized by peak average degree, clustering coefficient, and density. These networks demonstrated superior stability, with enhanced robustness and network cohesion. Conversely, acidic and alkaline conditions corresponded to reduced network complexity and stability, revealing a non-linear pH-network relationship. Distinctive associate clusters at phylum level suggested pH-specific community assemblages.
Conclusion
Neutral soil pH optimizes microbial network complexity and stability. Our findings provide empirical insights into pH-mediated microbial community organization, offering fundamental implications for understanding soil microbial ecology and ecosystem management.
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Data availability
The raw sequences used in this study have been deposited in DNA Data Bank of Japan (DDBJ) under the accession number of DRA016436.
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by National Natural Science Foundation of China (42407410), the Field Station Basic Research Project of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (KFJ-SW-YW043-2), Pilot Project for Mineral-land Integration of Jiangsu Province (3220220039), Jiangsu Provincial Territorial Ecological Monitoring, Jiangsu Agricultural Science and Technology Innovation Fund (CX (22) 2002) and Jiangsu Agricultural Biodiversity Cultivation and Utilization Research Center (0270756100ZX).
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Jianwei Zhang: Writing – original draft, Writing – review & editing, Formal analysis, Methodology, Investigation, Visualization, Conceptualization. Zhiying Guo: Writing – review & editing, Resources, Project administration, Funding acquisition, Supervision. Jie Liu: Methodology, Resources, Investigation, Writing – review & editing. XianZhang Pan: Resources, Supervision, Writing – review & editing. Yanan Huang: Writing – review & editing. Xiaodan Cui: Resources, Investigation. Yuanyuan Wang: Resources, Investigation. Yang Jin: Resources, Investigation. Jing Sheng: Writing – review & editing, Funding acquisition.
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Zhang, J., Guo, Z., Liu, J. et al. Neutral pH induces complex and stable soil microbial networks in agricultural ecosystems. Plant Soil (2025). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-024-07195-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-024-07195-4