In Appalachian ecosystems, forest disturbance has long-term effects on microbially-driven biogeochemical processes such as nitrogen (N) cycling. However, little is known regarding long-term responses of microbial communities to forest disturbance in the region. To determine responses of soil bacterial and fungal communities to forest disturbance, we characterized communities via 16s and ITS sequencing from soils across a range of historically disturbed forests and adjacent reference forests at the Coweeta Hydrologic Lab in the Appalachian mountains of North Carolina.
All soil chemistry and microbial community data is from 0-10 cm mineral soil cores collected from watersheds across the USDA Forest Service Coweeta Hydrologic Lab in June 2018. Complete sampling, processing, and analysis methods are described in the published manuscript: (link here)
Units for Soil chemistry data (FD_soil.csv) are as follows:
Moisture: g H2O/gram dry soil
DOC (dissolved organic carbon), MBC (microbial biomass carbon): ug C/gram dry soil
DON (dissolved organic nitrogen), MBN (microbial biomass nitrogen), TDN (total dissolved nitrogen), NH4, NO3: ug N/gram dry soil
TC (Total Carbon), TN (Total Nitrogen): mg/g dry soil
SIR (substrate-induced respiration): ug CO2-C/gram dry soil/day
Ernie Osburn: eosburn@vt.edu
Angela Weisel, Bobbie Niederlehner, Jason Love, VT Stream Team