Xingang Zhou

Northeast Agricultural University | NEAU · Department of Horticulture

Cover crops can promote the subsequent plant growth and improve soil potassium (K) fertility. However, whether and how wheat cover crop benefits cucumber growth and yield under different K regimes and their functional roles are still unclear. In this study, a two-year greenhouse experiment from spring 2017 to autumn 2018 was conducted to evaluate t...

Biochar amendment is acknowledged to favor plant resistance against soil‐borne diseases. Although plant‐beneficial bacteria enrichment in the rhizosphere is often proposed to be associated with this protection, the mechanism behind this stimulating effect remains unelucidated. Here, we tested whether biochar promotes plants to recruit beneficial ba...

Microbial decomposer community plays a key role in litter decomposition, which is an important regulator of soil carbon and nutrient cycling. Though changes in decomposer communities has been proposed as one of the potential underlying mechanisms driving the litter-mixture effects, direct evidence is still lacking.

Unguided exploitation has impaired the sustainability of natural resources of agronomic non-wood forest plants from understory boglands in boreal forests. The extreme consequences of plant–soil interplay on medicinal plant communities under continuous interruptions need to be understood to implement strategies which can cope with possible ecologica...

Soil microorganisms play an important role in agricultural ecosystem. However, there is little information about the effects of putative allelochemicals on specific soil microorganisms in vivo. Cucumber seedlings were treated with four concentrations of ferulic and p-hydroxybenzoic acids (0-1.0 μmol g-1 soil) in soil. Effects of ferulic and p-hydro...

(1) Background: Residue degradation plays a very important role in terrestrial ecosystems and residue mixing is the main factor affecting the degradation rates. However, in the agricultural systems, the effect of residue mixing on the degradation of pepper residues and the microbial community in pepper root residues is not clear. (2) Methods: In th...

In this study, we investigated the effects of wheat root exudates on soil bacterial communities in the watermelon rhizosphere using quantitative PCR and Illumina MiSeq sequencing. The qPCR results showed that wheat root exudates significantly increased the abundance of total bacteria, Pseudomonas, Bacillus and Streptomyces spp. Illumina MiSeq seque...

Plant interspecific interactions can be influenced by common mycorrhizal networks (CMNs), which mediate nutrient trade (rarely focused on K and such fungal benefits), but the involved mechanisms remain unclear. To test whether and how CMNs mediate nutrient trade to benefit individuals during interspecific interactions, the growth advantage and K di...

The application of biochar stimulates the activities of microorganisms that affect soil quality and plant growth. However, studies on the impacts of biochar mainly focus on a monoculture, its effects on interspecific interactions are rarely reported. Here, we investigated the impacts of biochar on tomato/potato–onion intercropped (TO) in a pot expe...

Agricultural intensification is known to alter the assembly of soil microbial communities, which regulate several critical ecosystem processes. However, the underlying ecological processes driving changes in microbial community assembly, particularly at the regional scale, remain poorly understood. Using 16S rDNA sequencing, we characterized soil b...

Background and aimsCrop diversification usually increase nutrient use efficiency and productivity of crops, but we still lack deeper understandings of the underlying mechanisms. Here we aimed to study the role of root exudates and soil microbial communities in mobilization of soil P during an intercropping system.Methods Different barrier treatment...

Soil fungal communities, consisting of a few abundant taxa but many rare taxa, play critical roles in terrestrial ecosystem functioning. However, little is known about ecological processes governing the assembly of abundant and rare sub-communities in response to agricultural intensification, which can threaten soil biodiversity. Here, we performed...

The traditional way of monocropping and current strategies of use of inorganic chemical-based pesticides and fertilizers are the main barriers in development of sustainable agriculture. Similarly, sickness is a growing issue because of degradation of agricultural land due to continuous sole cropping. On the other hand, intercropping is an old but e...

Paddy-upland rotation is an effective agricultural management practice for alleviating soil sickness. However, the effect of varying degrees of flooding on the soil microbial community and crop performance remains unclear. We conducted a pot experiment to determine the effects of two soil water content (SWC) and two flooding durations on the soil m...

Facilitative interactions occur between the plants in intercropping systems, however, the underlying allelopathy mechanisms are poorly understood. We determined the effects of potato-onion (Allium cepa var. agrogatum Don.) intercrop on root morphology of tomato (Lycopersicon esculenum L.) through volatile organic compounds (VOCs). There were four t...

We grew cucumber in pots in greenhouse for 9-successive cropping cycles and analyzed the rhizosphere Pseudomonas spp. community structure and abundance by PCR-denaturing gradient gel electrophoresis and quantitative PCR. Results showed that continuous monocropping changed the cucumber rhizosphere Pseudomonas spp. community. The number of DGGE bands...

Continuous monocropping can cause the buildup of autotoxins (e.g., phenolic compounds) in the soil, which can alter soil microbial community and inhibit plant growth. However, how different phenolic compounds affect certain soil microbiota is unclear. Here, we studied the response of cucumber rhizosphere Trichoderma spp. community to exogenously ap...

Intercropping can achieve sustainable agricultural development by increasing plant diversity. In this study, we investigated the effects of tomato monoculture and tomato/potato-onion intercropping systems on tomato seedling growth and changes of soil microbial communities in greenhouse conditions. Results showed that the intercropping with potato-o...

Arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi (AMF) play key roles in nutrient cycling and supporting agricultural productivity. Although both phosphorus (P) fertilization and plant-plant interactions can induce changes in the AMF community, if and how their interaction effects can affect the AMF community remain unknown. A greenhouse experiment was conducted to in...

We investigated in greenhouse experiment, the effects of intercropping of wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) with cucumber (Cucumis sativus L.) on the leaf senescence of later crop. The leaves of the cucumber plants under wheat intercropping (CW) showed higher chlorophyll content and lower intercellular CO2 concentration than in cucumber monocropping (C...

Plant-microbes interactions in soil are mainly driven by plant root exudates. However, how different compounds present in root exudates can affect the specific soil microbial communities has not been well studied yet. We studied the glucose, succinic, p-hydroxybenzoic, p-coumaric and glutamic acids on soil Pseudomonas spp. communality in a microcos...

Sub-optimal temperatures can adversely affect tomato (Solanum lycopersicum) growth, and K+ plays an important role in the cold tolerance of plants. However, gene expression and K+ uptake in tomato in response to sub-optimal temperatures are still not very clear. To address these questions, one cold-tolerant tomato cultivar, Dongnong 722 (T722), and...

Rhizosphere microbial communities of cucumber seedlings treated with ferulic (FA) and p-hydroxybenzoic acids (PHBA) were analyzed by quantitative PCR and Illumina sequencing. Then, growth responses of cucumber seedlings to changes in the composition of rhizosphere microbial communities were assessed. Compared with PHBA, FA had higher inhibitory eff...

Enhancing the plant rhizosphere microbial community function by increasing plant diversity in the field is a promising strategy for enhancing agricultural sustainability. This study evaluated the effectiveness of the intercropping of wheat in controlling cucumber Fusarium wilt disease. Bacterial community diversity and abundance in cucumber rhizosp...

It is well established now that cropping system has great influence on soil microbial communities, but still advance techniques are required to study more of changes in soil microbiota during cropping systems. Here we used high-throughput sequencing to explore the effects of crop rotation with Indian mustard on composition of cucumber rhizosphere f...

Aims Although intercropping and pathogen invasion can affect the plant rhizosphere bacterial community, how intercropping affects the rhizosphere bacterial community in response to pathogen invasion is poorly understood. Methods The root system of watermelon was separated into two halves and placed in separate pots for Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. ni...

Background and aims Green manuring can suppress crop diseases and change soil microbial communities, but the functional significances of changes in soil microbial communities are unclear. Methods Effects of Indian mustard (Brassica juncea), wild rocket (Diplotaxis tenuifolia) and wheat (Triticum aestivum) green manures on cucumber (Cucumis sativus...

Crop monocropping usually results in an enrichment of soil-borne pathogens in soil. Crop rotation is an environmentally friendly method for controlling soil-borne diseases. Plant rhizosphere microorganisms, especially plant-beneficial microorganisms, play a major role in protecting plants from pathogens, but responses of these microorganisms to cro...

Companion cropping with wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) can enhance watermelon [Citrullus lanatus (Thunb.) Matsum. & Nakai] wilt disease resistance against Fusarium oxysporum f. sp. niveum. However, the mechanism of resistance induction remains unknown. In this study, the effects of microbial community dynamics and the interactions between wheat and w...

In the last few decades, incredible advances have been made in understanding the way of communication among members of kingdom plantae. Some plants fight for their existence and try to suppress the growth of other plants, while some share resources to benefit each other for their survival. During all these processes, plants use several biotic and a...

Root exudates mediate soil microbiome composition and diversity, which might further influence plant development and health. Vanillic acid from root exudates is usually referred as autotoxin of cucumber, however, how vanillic acid affect soil microbial community diversities and abundances remains unclear. In this study, vanillic acid (VA; 0.02, 0.0...

In Greenhouse experiment, we studied the effects of wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) intercropping on the nitrogen metabolism during the senescence of cucumber (Cucumis sativus L.) leaves. The results showed that compared with cucumber monoculture, intercropping with wheat increased the content of soluble protein, nitrate nitrogen, free amino acid and...

The above article originally published with an error present in the article title. This is now presented correctly in this article.

Cucumber seedlings grown in soil were treated with vanillin at 0.1 μmol/g soil and the cucumber rhizosphere fungal composition was analyzed by high-throughput sequencing of total fungal ITS regions. A total of 207,557 quality fungal ITS sequences were obtained and these sequences were classified into more than 390 OTUs at 97% sequence similarity. V...

Different concentrations of syringic acid were added to cucumber seedlings rhizosphere and their effects on soil Fusarium and Trichoderma abundances and structures were evaluated by qPCR and PCR-DGGE. Results showed that all concentrations of syringic acid (0.02-0.2 μmol g⁻¹ soil) did not change the community structure and abundance of Trichoderma....

Cucumber seedlings grown in soil from a grass field were treated with vanillin at 0.1 μmol/g concentration for 10 days. Its rhizosphere bacterial composition was analyzed by high-throughput sequencing of 16S rRNA genes on an Illumina Miseq platform. A total of 175,273 quality sequences were obtained and these were classified into more than 2,100 OT...

Phytotoxic effects of phenolic compounds have been extensively studied, but less attention has been given to the effects of these compounds on soil microbial communities, which are crucial to the productivity of agricultural systems. Responses of cucumber rhizosphere bacterial and fungal communities to syringic acid (SA), a phenolic compound with a...

The most abundant bacterial OTUs in the syringic acid (SA)- and water (W)-treated soil samples. OTUs were delineated at the 97% sequence similarity. Only OTUs with average relative abundances >0.5% in at least one treatment were presented. Values were expressed as mean±standard error. OTU ID in bold indicates its relative abundance was significant...

The most abundant fungal OTUs in the syringic acid (SA)- and water (W)-treated soil samples. OTUs were delineated at the 97% sequence similarity. Only OTUs with average relative abundances >0.1% in at least one treatment were presented. Values were expressed as mean±standard error. OTU ID in bold indicates its relative abundance was significant dif...

Rarefaction curves of the number of operational taxonomic units (OTUs) for bacterial (a) and fungal communities (b) in each sample. Random subsamples of 21,334 16S rRNA gene and 30,394 ITS gene sequences per sample were used to generate the rarefaction curves. OTUs were delineated at the 97% sequence similarity. (TIF)

Relative abundances of fungal families in the syringic acid (SA)- and water (W)-treated soil samples. Fungal families with average relative abundances >1% (a) and >0.1% (b) in at least one treatment were shown. Values are expressed as mean±standard error. Asterisks indicate significant difference between treatments based on Welch’s t test (P<0.05)....

Exogenous silicates can enhance plant resistance to pathogens and change soil microbial communities. However, the relationship between changes in soil microbial communities and enhanced plant resistance remains unclear. Here, effects of exogenous sodium silicate on cucumber (Cucumis sativus L.) seedling resistance to Fusarium wilt caused by the soi...

Soil microbial communities have profound effects on the growth, nutrition and health of plants in agroecosystems. Understanding soil microbial dynamics in cropping systems can assist in determining how agricultural practices influence soil processes mediated by microorganisms. In this study, soil bacterial communities were monitored in a continuous...