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Agricultural Management And Labile Carbon Additions Affect Soil Microbial Community Structure And Interact With Carbon And Nitrogen Cycling, Sean T. Berthrong, Daniel H. Buckely, Laurie E. Drinkwater

Scholarship and Professional Work - LAS

We investigated how conversion from conventional agriculture to organic management affected the structure and biogeochemical function of soil microbial communities. We hypothesized the following. (1) Changing agricultural management practices will alter soil microbial community structure driven by increasing microbial diversity in organic management. (2) Organically managed soil microbial communities will mineralize more N and will also mineralize more N in response to substrate addition than conventionally managed soil communities. (3) Microbial communities under organic management will be more efficient and respire less added C. Soils from organically and conventionally managed agroecosystems were incubated with and without glucose (¹³C) …