PMID- 35183631 OWN - NLM STAT- MEDLINE DCOM- 20220427 LR - 20220427 IS - 1879-1026 (Electronic) IS - 0048-9697 (Linking) VI - 825 DP - 2022 Jun 15 TI - Low-disturbance farming regenerates healthy deep soil toward sustainable agriculture - Evidence from long-term no-tillage with stover mulching in Mollisols. PG - 153929 LID - S0048-9697(22)01021-X [pii] LID - 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.153929 [doi] AB - Currently, global agricultural development is in a critical period, as it contends with a growing population, degraded farmland, and serious environmental issues. Although low-disturbance practices are recommended to improve soil health, it is unclear whether such practices benefit critical deep soil functioning. Here, we compared the soil bacterial communities and physicochemical parameters across 3-m deep soil profiles in a Mollisol of Northeast China at the end of the dormant season after 10 years of farming under conventional tillage without stover mulching (CT), no-tillage without stover mulching (NTNS), and no-tillage with stover mulching (NTSM). We found that low-disturbance practices (NTNS and NTSM), compared with CT, evidently promoted soil bacterial species richness and diversity and enriched potential metabolic diversity. When compared to the bacterial communities in CT, the vertical dissimilarity of bacterial communities in NTNS decreased, while that in NTSM increased, indicating that no-tillage alone homogenized the composition of the bacterial community through soil depth profiles, but straw mulching enhanced the uniqueness of community composition at each layer. In comparison to CT, no-tillage with stover mulching significantly increased the soil water content and root-associated organic carbon (SEOC), and decreased soil pH. Mineral nitrogen declined with depth to 60 cm and then increased to its maximum at 250-300 cm under CT and at 120-150 cm under NTNS and NTSM. More mineral nitrogen at 0-150 cm under low-disturbance practices would provide more available nitrogen for crops in the coming growing season, while the accumulated nitrogen at 150-300 cm under CT may leach into the groundwater. Taken together, our results show that low-disturbance practices can regenerate whole-soil bacterial diversity and potential function, and promote water retention and nitrogen holding capacity within the root zone, thus reducing the dose of nitrogen fertilizer and mitigating nitrogen contamination to deep groundwater, ultimately contributing to agricultural sustainability in Mollisol regions. CI - Copyright (c) 2022 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved. FAU - Deng, Fangbo AU - Deng F AD - Key Laboratory of Forest Ecology and Management, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China; University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China; Key Lab of Conservation Tillage & Ecological Agriculture, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, Liaoning Province, China. FAU - Wang, Hongjun AU - Wang H AD - Duke University Wetland Center, Nicholas School of the Environment, Duke University, Durham, NC 27708, USA. FAU - Xie, Hongtu AU - Xie H AD - Key Laboratory of Forest Ecology and Management, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China; Key Lab of Conservation Tillage & Ecological Agriculture, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, Liaoning Province, China. FAU - Bao, Xuelian AU - Bao X AD - Key Laboratory of Forest Ecology and Management, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China; Key Lab of Conservation Tillage & Ecological Agriculture, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, Liaoning Province, China. FAU - He, Hongbo AU - He H AD - Key Laboratory of Forest Ecology and Management, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China; Key Lab of Conservation Tillage & Ecological Agriculture, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, Liaoning Province, China. FAU - Zhang, Xudong AU - Zhang X AD - Key Laboratory of Forest Ecology and Management, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China; Key Lab of Conservation Tillage & Ecological Agriculture, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, Liaoning Province, China. FAU - Liang, Chao AU - Liang C AD - Key Laboratory of Forest Ecology and Management, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China; Key Lab of Conservation Tillage & Ecological Agriculture, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, Liaoning Province, China. Electronic address: cliang823@gmail.com. LA - eng PT - Journal Article DEP - 20220217 PL - Netherlands TA - Sci Total Environ JT - The Science of the total environment JID - 0330500 RN - 0 (Soil) RN - 059QF0KO0R (Water) RN - N762921K75 (Nitrogen) SB - IM MH - *Agriculture/methods MH - Bacteria MH - China MH - Farms MH - Nitrogen/analysis MH - *Soil/chemistry MH - Water OTO - NOTNLM OT - Bacterial diversity OT - Bacterial function OT - Nitrogen OT - No-tillage OT - Regenerative farming OT - Stover mulching COIS- Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper. EDAT- 2022/02/21 06:00 MHDA- 2022/04/28 06:00 CRDT- 2022/02/20 20:30 PHST- 2021/10/02 00:00 [received] PHST- 2022/02/12 00:00 [revised] PHST- 2022/02/12 00:00 [accepted] PHST- 2022/02/21 06:00 [pubmed] PHST- 2022/04/28 06:00 [medline] PHST- 2022/02/20 20:30 [entrez] AID - S0048-9697(22)01021-X [pii] AID - 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.153929 [doi] PST - ppublish SO - Sci Total Environ. 2022 Jun 15;825:153929. doi: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.153929. Epub 2022 Feb 17.