Abstract
Split nitrogen (N) application is an important agronomic measure for improving wheat yield and quality, yet how rhizosphere nitrogen-transforming microbes respond to split N strategies and the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. This study investigated the effects of six N treatments, including control, basal application, jointing-stage soil topdressing, and foliar applications at booting, anthesis, and 10 days post-anthesis, on the community structure and diversity of key rhizospheric nitrogen cyclers (ammonia-oxidizing archaea (AOA), ammonia-oxidizing bacteria (AOB), and nitrite-oxidizing bacteria (NOB)) in wheat. Results showed that AOB and NOB alpha diversity were significantly modified by split N application. N application at anthesis enhanced AOB richness and diversity more than the later application, while concurrently decreasing NOB diversity. Booting-stage application enriched Nitrosospira and Nitrosomonas in the AOB community, whereas anthesis application increased Nitrososphaera sp. JG1 in AOA, but decreased Candidatus Nitrospira inopinata in NOB. Redundancy analysis identified soil pH, moisture, organic carbon, and key enzyme activities as the main drivers of microbial community assembly. Although no significant differences were observed in key agronomic traits among treatments, the 10 days post-anthesis treatment showed numerically superior yield and N uptake. Notably, AOB community evenness was significantly positively correlated with grain yield, protein yield, and N uptake, whereas NOB community diversity showed negative correlations. These findings demonstrate that split N application, particularly late foliar spray at 10 days post-anthesis, can modulate soil physico-chemical properties to selectively shape nitrogen-transforming microbial communities (notably AOB) in the wheat rhizosphere. This study provides a theoretical foundation for designing precise N management strategies rooted in rhizosphere ecology, with the goal of simultaneously improving yield, grain quality, and nitrogen use efficiency.
Abstract from the paper’s OpenAlex record; open copy licensed cc-by. Read at the source ↗
The text the model read, with the source record’s inline markup (italics, sub- and superscripts) rendered and its character entities decoded; quote offsets refer to the raw text.
Claims 15
Claim · model-written summary
Split N significantly altered AOB alpha diversity.
- Taxon
- wheat
Triticum aestivumt0 - Treatment
- split N applicatione0
- Interactor
- AOBe0symbiont
- Outcome
- alpha diversitye0
Not reportedComparatorDirection
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“AOB and NOB alpha diversity were significantly modified by split N application”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
Split N significantly altered NOB alpha diversity.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivumt0
- Treatment
- split N applicatione0
- Interactor
- NOBe0symbiont
- Outcome
- NOB alpha diversitye0
Not reportedComparatorDirection
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“AOB and NOB alpha diversity were significantly modified by split N application”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
Anthesis N increased AOB richness and diversity more than later N application.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivumt0
- Treatment
- N application at anthesise0
- Interactor
- AOBe0symbiont
- Outcome
- AOB richness and diversitye0
- Direction
- enhancede0
- Comparator
- later applicatione0
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“N application at anthesis enhanced AOB richness and diversity more than the later application”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
Anthesis N decreased NOB diversity.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivumt0
- Treatment
- N application at anthesise0
- Interactor
- NOBe0symbiont
- Outcome
- NOB diversitye0
- Direction
- decreasinge0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“N application at anthesis enhanced AOB richness and diversity more than the later application, while concurrently decreasing NOB diversity”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
Booting-stage N enriched Nitrosospira in the AOB community.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivumt0
- Treatment
- Booting-stage applicatione0
- Interactor
- NitrosospiraNitrosospirae0symbiont
- Outcome
- Nitrosospirae0
- Direction
- enrichede0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“Booting-stage application enriched Nitrosospira and Nitrosomonas in the AOB community”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
Booting-stage N enriched Nitrosomonas in the AOB community.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivumt0
- Treatment
- Booting-stage applicatione0
- Interactor
- Nitrosomonas
Nitrosomonase0symbiont - Outcome
- Nitrosomonase0
- Direction
- enrichede0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“Booting-stage application enriched Nitrosospira and Nitrosomonas in the AOB community”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
Anthesis N increased Nitrososphaera sp. JG1 in AOA.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivumt0
- Treatment
- anthesis applicatione0
- Interactor
- Nitrososphaera sp. JG1
Nitrososphaera sp. JG1e0symbiont - Outcome
- Nitrososphaera sp. JG1 in AOAe0
- Direction
- increasede0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“anthesis application increased Nitrososphaera sp. JG1 in AOA”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
Anthesis N decreased Candidatus Nitrospira inopinata in NOB.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivumt0
- Treatment
- anthesis applicatione0
- Interactor
- Candidatus Nitrospira inopinataCandidatus Nitrospira inopinatae0symbiont
- Outcome
- Candidatus Nitrospira inopinata in NOBe0
- Direction
- decreasede0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“anthesis application increased Nitrososphaera sp. JG1 in AOA, but decreased Candidatus Nitrospira inopinata in NOB”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
Soil pH, moisture, organic carbon and enzyme activity were major drivers of microbial community assembly.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivumt0
- Outcome
- microbial community assemblye0
- Setting
- soil pH, moisture, organic carbon, and key enzyme activitiese0
Not reportedDirection
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“soil pH, moisture, organic carbon, and key enzyme activities as the main drivers of microbial community assembly”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
Key agronomic traits did not differ significantly among N treatments.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivumt0
- Treatment
- treatmentse0
- Outcome
- key agronomic traitse0
- Direction
- no significant differencese0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“no significant differences were observed in key agronomic traits among treatments”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
The 10-day post-anthesis treatment had numerically superior yield.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivumt0
- Treatment
- 10 days post-anthesis treatmente0
- Outcome
- yielde0
- Direction
- numerically superiore0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“the 10 days post-anthesis treatment showed numerically superior yield and N uptake”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
The 10-day post-anthesis treatment had numerically superior N uptake.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivumt0
- Treatment
- 10 days post-anthesis treatmente0
- Outcome
- N uptakee0
- Direction
- numerically superiore0
Not reportedComparator
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“the 10 days post-anthesis treatment showed numerically superior yield and N uptake”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
AOB evenness was significantly positively associated with grain yield, protein yield and N uptake.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivumt0
- Interactor
- AOBe0symbiont
- Outcome
- grain yield, protein yield, and N uptakee0
- Direction
- positively correlatede0
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“AOB community evenness was significantly positively correlated with grain yield, protein yield, and N uptake”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
NOB diversity was negatively correlated with grain yield, protein yield and N uptake.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivumt0
- Interactor
- NOBe0symbiont
- Outcome
- NOB community diversitye0
- Direction
- negative correlationse0
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“NOB community diversity showed negative correlations”
t0“Wheat”
Claim · model-written summary
Late foliar spray can shape rhizosphere nitrifier communities through soil properties.
- Taxon
- wheatTriticum aestivume0
- Treatment
- late foliar spray at 10 days post-anthesise0
- Interactor
- AOBe0symbiont
- Outcome
- nitrogen-transforming microbial communitiese0
- Qualifier
- modulate soil physico-chemical propertiese0
Organisms pictured · Representative pictures of the matched species, not figures from the paper.
Verbatim
e0“late foliar spray at 10 days post-anthesis, can modulate soil physico-chemical properties to selectively shape nitrogen-transforming microbial communities (notably AOB) in the wheat rhizosphere”