Steering microbiomes by organic amendments towards climate-smart agricultural soils

authored by: Kristof Brenzinger, Ohana Y.A. Costa, Adrian Ho, Guusje Koorneef, Bjorn Robroek, Douwe Molenaar, Gerard Korthals, Paul L.E. Bodelier
Abstract: We steered the soil microbiome via applications of organic residues (mix of cover crop residues, sewage sludge + compost, and digestate + compost) to enhance multiple ecosystem services in line with climate-smart agriculture. Our result highlights the potential to reduce greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions from agricultural soils by the application of specific organic amendments (especially digestate + compost). Unexpectedly, also the addition of mineral fertilizer in our mesocosms led to similar combined GHG emissions than one of the specific organic amendments. However, the application of organic amendments has the potential to increase soil C, which is not the case when using mineral fertilizer. While GHG emissions from cover crop residues were significantly higher compared to mineral fertilizer and the other organic amendments, crop growth was promoted. Furthermore, all organic amendments induced a shift in the diversity and abundances of key microbial groups. We show that organic amendments have the potential to not only lower GHG emissions by modifying the microbial community abundance and composition, but also favour crop growth-promoting microorganisms. This modulation of the microbial community by organic amendments bears the potential to turn soils into more climate-smart soils in comparison to the more conventional use of mineral fertilizers.
Organisation(s): Institute of Microbiology
External Organisation(s): Netherlands Institute of Ecology
Julius Maximilian University of Würzburg
Wageningen University and Research
Radboud University Nijmegen
Vrije Universiteit
Type: Article
Journal: Biology and fertility of soils
Volume: 57
Pages: 1053-1074
No. of pages: 22
ISSN: 0178-2762
Publication date: 11.2021
Publication status: Published
Peer reviewed: Yes
ASJC Scopus subject areas: Microbiology, Agronomy and Crop Science, Soil Science
Sustainable Development Goals: SDG 2 - Zero Hunger, SDG 13 - Climate Action
Electronic version(s): https://doi.org/10.1007/s00374-021-01599-5 (Access: Open)