Agricultural Land Use Influences Bacteriophage Community Diversity, Richness, and Heterogeneity

• Published in: Current microbiology 2023-01, Vol.80 (1), p.10-10, Article 10
• Main Authors: Bora, Sudipta Sankar, Naorem, Romen Singh, Hazarika, Dibya Jyoti, Dasgupta, Abhisek, Churaman, Amrita, Gogoi, Manuranjan, Barooah, Madhumita
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Abundance; Agricultural biotechnology; Agricultural land; Agriculture; Aluminum; Bacteriophages - genetics; Biodiversity; Biogeochemistry; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Biotechnology; Community structure; Continuous cropping; Crops; Cultivation; Gardens & gardening; Heterogeneity; Hydrology; Land use; Life Sciences; Metagenomics; Microbiology; Mixed cropping; Phages; Plantations; Principal components analysis; Rhizosphere; Seed orchards; Seeds; Soil; Soil chemistry; Soil microorganisms; Soil pH; Soils; Species richness; Structure-function relationships; Tea; Viruses
• ISSN: 0343-8651; 1432-0991
• DOI: 10.1007/s00284-022-03129-4

The last two decades have witnessed a large-scale conversion of crop cultivation areas into small and mid-sized tea plantations in Assam, India. Agricultural land-use pattern positively or negatively influences native hydrology and above- and belowground biodiversity. Very little is known about the effect of agricultural land-use patterns on the soil virus (especially, bacteriophage) community structure and function. This metagenomic-based study evaluated the rhizosphere viral community structure of three interlinked cultivation areas, viz., mixed cropping area (coded as CP1), tea-seed orchard (CP2), and monocropping tea cultivation (CP3). The bacteriophages belonged to four major classes with the dominance of Malgrandaviricetes (CP1: 79.37%; CP2: 64.62%; CP3: 4.85%) followed by Caudoviricetes (CP1: 20.49%; CP2: 35.22%; CP3: 90.29%), Faserviricetes (CP1: 0.03%; CP2: 0.08%; CP3: 3.88%), and Tectiliviricetes (CP1: 0.12%; CP2: 0.07%; CP3: 0.97%). Microviruses dominated the phage population in both CP1 and CP2, representing 79.35% and 64.59% of total bacteriophage abundance. Both CP1 and CP2 had higher bacteriophage richness (species richness, R in CP1: 65; R in CP2: 66) and lower evenness (Pielou's evenness index, J in CP1: 0.531; J in CP2: 0.579) compared to the CP3 (R: 30; J: 0.902). Principal component analysis of edaphic soil factors and bacteriophage community structure showed a reverse-proportional correlation between the levels of Al saturation, and exchangeable Al 3+ ions with that of soil pH, and bacteriophage abundance. Our study indicates that monocropping tea cultivation soil bears less viral richness, abundance, and heterogeneity.