Microbial Communities under Siege! Petroleum Hydrocarbons vs Microbial Community
by: Diana Tarver
Figure 1. Species diversity and functional community and its relationship with soil multifunctionality in soils with different petroleum hydrocarbon contamination levels. The Simpson index (A) and Chao index (B) of the microbial community in highly contaminated soils (H), lightly contaminated soils (L) and uncontaminated soils (N). The Pearson correlation between the Simpson index (C) or Chao index (D) and soil multifunctionality in highly contaminated soils (H), lightly contaminated soils (L) and uncontaminated soils (N). The Pearson correlation between the Simpson index (E) or Chao index (F) and soil multifunctionality in all soil samples. The Wilcoxon rank-sum test was used to calculate significant differences (*p < 0.05; **p < 0.01; ***p < 0.001).
Environmental microbes are an important part of keeping the soils functioning and our tampering and adding of chemicals into the environment has made them evolve, and adapt to these chemicals. Petroleum hydrocarbon, it changes the soil environment increasing organic carbon content changing how microbes interreact with soil. Some microbes have been able to adapt and to these contaminated soil. This study carried out by Wenjuan Jia and colleagues wanted to see how the diversity of these soil microbes were being affected by the petroleum hydrocarbon contamination. They went ahead and collected samples from 3 sites in Beijing China that had low, medium and high contamination. With these soil samples they did some culture dependent and independent studies on the microbes. Results concluded that there was a much lower diversity in high concentrations of petroleum hydrocarbons but surprisingly in the lower concentrations there was a huge increase in diversity giving us hope that these contaminated site will eventually heal. Although we may have known about the idea that microbes can help with contamination in the environment it is good to be able to see when we need to intervene this data could bring us closer in identifying what kind of management plan we can implement.
Original Article
Wenjuan J., Lirong C., Qiuyang T., Yueqiao L., Junfeng D., Kai Y., Qing Y., Senjie W., Jing L., Geng N., Lei Z., Aizhong D. (2023). Response of the soil microbial community to petroleum hydrocarbon stress shows a threshold effect: research on aged realistic contaminated fields. Frontiers in Microbiology Volume 14; 10.3389/fmicb.2023.1188229
