Background and Aims Industrial oil palm plantation management degrades tropical soils and disrupts ecosystem functions. Applying oil palm leaf litter can help restore soil fertility, but the underlying fungal-driven decomposition and nitrogen recycling remain understudied. This study examines fungal succession in degrading oil palm leaf litter, the fate of litter-derived nitrogen in soil and roots, and the potential for the re...

We studied the effects of cover crop treatments (fallow or cover crop) and microbial grain inoculation (control, arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF), and AMF + bacteria) on soil microbial diversity, community composition, and maize yield across four field sites characterized by different farming systems over two consecutive years. Farming system emerged as the dominant factor driving variations in microbial community compositio...

Key message In mixed combinations, the negative impact of water reduction and N addition is mitigated for F. sylvatica , but not for conifers. Insight into the responses of trees in mixed and monospecific cultivation to water scarcity and nitrogen (N) excess is necessary to recommend suitable tree mixtures for future European forests. Our aim was to investigate the impact of water reduction, N addition or water reduction + N a...

Formation of mineral‐associated organic matter (MAOM) supports the accumulation and stabilization of carbon (C) in soil, and thus, is a key factor in the global C cycle. Little is known about the interplay of mineral type, land use and management intensity in MAOM formation, especially on subdecadal time scales. We exposed mineral containers with goethite or illite, the most abundant iron oxide and phyllosilicate clay in tempe...

In higher plants, the xylem, which is crucial for water and nutrient transport, also contains a diverse proteome. The composition of the xylem sap proteome responds dynamically to changes in environmental conditions. Important functions are maintenance of structural integrity and defense against invading pathogens. Knowledge on signals that trigger proteomic changes is scarce. Better understanding of these processes may contri...

Summary Root‐associated fungi (RAF) link nutrient fluxes between soil and roots and thus play important roles in ecosystem functioning. To enhance our understanding of the factors that control RAF, we fitted statistical models to explain variation in RAF community structure using data from 150 temperate forest sites covering a broad range of environmental conditions and chemical root traits. We found that variation in RAF comm...

Root‐associated mycobiomes ( RAM s) link plant and soil ecological processes, thereby supporting ecosystem functions. Understanding the forces that govern the assembly of RAM s is key to sustainable ecosystem management. Here, we dissected RAM s according to functional guilds and combined phylogenetic and multivariate analyses to distinguish and quantify the forces driving RAM assembly processes. Across large biogeographic sca...

While forest management strongly influences biodiversity, it remains unclear how the structural and compositional changes caused by management affect different community dimensions (e.g. richness, specialisation, abundance or completeness) and how this differs between taxa. We assessed the effects of nine forest features (representing stand structure, heterogeneity and tree composition) on thirteen above‐ and belowground troph...

Summary 16 S rRNA genes and transcripts of A cidobacteria were investigated in 57 grassland and forest soils of three different geographic regions. A cidobacteria contributed 9–31% of bacterial 16 S rRNA genes whereas the relative abundances of the respective transcripts were 4–16%. The specific cellular 16 S rRNA content (determined as molar ratio of rRNA : rRNA genes) ranged between 3 and 80, indicating a low in situ growth...