ORE-CZ: Soil Microbial Characteristics of a Salinizing Forest Ecosystem within the Chesapeake Bay watershed

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Soil is one of the earth’s most important natural resources and is largely non-renewable on human timescales. Without the water, nutrients and physical support provided by soil and its microbes, most plants, and the animals that depend on them, including humans, could not exist. Soils in coastal forests, particularly in low-lying and shallow zones, are vulnerable to sea-level rise and saltwater intrusion, resulting in soil salinization. This change in environmental conditions will affect the soil microbial population that performs fundamental functions, such as nutrient cycling, breaking down residues, and stimulating plant growth. Predicting the overall response of soil microbial communities to climate change is an ongoing challenge in coastal ecosystems. This project will survey the diversity of soil and root-associated microbial communities across soil salinity gradients in coastal forests in the Chesapeake Bay watershed. Climatic and soil properties will also be collected for comparison with the microbial communities’ composition and distribution. The results of this project will provide more robust knowledge of the microbial response to salinizing conditions in coastal forests. The successful completion of this project will outline the opportunities for a more sustainable management and protection of coastal areas that are important for enhancing resilience to climate change. This project will also engage minority students in intensive experiential learning with interdisciplinary research. The overall goal of this project is to investigate soil health and the coastal soil ecosystem integrity in response to saltwater intrusion driven by sea-level rise. To assess these linkages, the project will 1) characterize soil and root-associated microbial communities across soil salinity gradients in coastal forested ecosystems in the Chesapeake Bay to link soil salinization and the structure of plant-associated microbiota, 2) study plant-microbe interactions at the soil-root interface to understand whether plant stress resistance in salinizing forest ecosystems aligns with plant strategies or microbial consortia, and 3) elucidate the influence of environmental factors (soil properties and seasonal variation) on microbial communities’ composition. The research site will be at Monie Bay in eastern Maryland, which is in the Chesapeake Bay National Estuarine Research Reserve and is also one of the current NSF-supported Critical Zone Network (CZN) research sites. The findings of this research will deepen knowledge of the functional role of microbial communities in maintaining and improving soil health. This project is supported by the Critical Zone program in the Division of Earth Sciences and the Historically Black Colleges and Universities – Undergraduate Program (HBCU-UP) in the Human Resources Division.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.