Protists and collembolans alter microbial community composition, C dynamics and soil aggregation in simplified consumer–prey systems

Erktan, Amandine; Rillig, Matthias C.; Carminati, Andrea; Jousset, Alexandre; Scheu, Stefan

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-17-4961-2020

Articles | Volume 17, issue 20

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-17-4961-2020

© Author(s) 2020. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-17-4961-2020

© Author(s) 2020. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 17, issue 20

Research article

|

17 Oct 2020

Research article |

| 17 Oct 2020

Protists and collembolans alter microbial community composition, C dynamics and soil aggregation in simplified consumer–prey systems

Amandine Erktan, Matthias C. Rillig, Andrea Carminati, Alexandre Jousset, and Stefan Scheu

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Final revised paper (published on 17 Oct 2020)
Preprint (discussion started on 25 Feb 2020)

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

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- Supplement

RC1: 'Review', Anonymous Referee #1, 16 Mar 2020
- AC1: 'Final response to Referee #1', Amandine Erktan, 28 Apr 2020
RC2: 'Review Part 2', Anonymous Referee #2, 17 Mar 2020
- AC2: 'Final response to Referee #2', Amandine Erktan, 28 Apr 2020

Peer-review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

ED: Reconsider after major revisions (06 May 2020) by Jianming Xu

AR by Amandine Erktan on behalf of the Authors (12 May 2020) Author's response

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (17 Jun 2020) by Jianming Xu

RR by Anonymous Referee #3 (28 Jun 2020)

RR by Anonymous Referee #2 (14 Jul 2020)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

After reviewing this manuscript for a second time, I believe that the authors have done a nice job of addressing my comments. The introduction is far less repetitive and also emphasizes the broader scope of their study. I congratulate them on the hard work they have put into this revision.

My only main concern regarding their methodology is with regard to their CUE assessment. They attempt to discern whether C came from litter or from soil by examining the difference in 13C in C4 versus C3 plants. However, their little mixture included both C4 and C3 plants, making it difficult to decipher the source of C. I request that they clarify their methodology, or include an important caveat into their methods/results about how C could have come from litter that was attributed to soil

One minor concern is that there are frequent locations where the grammar needs revising. I have tried to help point these areas out, but I may have missed a few. In general the manuscript is well written, but there are some consistent subject-verb tense issues as well as a few awkward phrasing locations.

However, overall I find this to be a well designed study and of importance to the field.

MINOR COMMENTS:

Line 43: should be “has been” not “have been”

Line 49: change “Since” to “For”

Line 51: change linking to link

Line 63: change to “higher contents of lipids and proteins” or “higher lipid and protein content”

Line 80: change as well to also

Line 81: change to evidence, not evidences

Line 89: change to “has also been reported”

Line 125: were added

Line 138-139: I feel like there is a word missing or something does not connect in these lines.

Line 143: H. nitidus shows

Line 144: “when fed this” drop “on”

Line 144: change as well to also

Line 160: You mention that the litter was a mixture of maize and wheat, though more dominated by maize. Because the agricultural soil C is also mainly from wheat, how are you able to split your understanding of whether the soil C consumption was from the litter or soil organic matter?

Line 232: “were” captured

Line 243: remove the word “only”

Line 250: change as well to also had

Line 253: remove as well

While not a essential change (and admittedly a preference of this reviewer), it would be much better to see the actual p-values instead of > or < 0.05 values.

Line 271: insert the at “in THE presence of”

A more general opening paragraph to the discussion would be helpful. The authors jump into results again and then focus on specific results quite quickly. I would highly recommend a summarizing paragraph that emphasizes the key results and they relevance before jumping into such detail.
Additionally, the first paragraph of the discussion is currently quite long and addresses multiple ideas. Could the authors break it up into more than one paragraph?

Line 388: awkward phrasing in “Despite of that”

Line 406: change to “also feeding on bacteria”

Line 414: as well to also

Line 414: it has “long been assumed”

Line 416: “a” microbial wash

Line 432: change to “were observed”

Table 2: Again it would be preferable to have real p-values

Figure 2b: What does NRD stand for?

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ED: Publish subject to minor revisions (review by editor) (01 Aug 2020) by Jianming Xu

AR by Amandine Erktan on behalf of the Authors (14 Aug 2020) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Publish as is (27 Aug 2020) by Jianming Xu

AR by Amandine Erktan on behalf of the Authors (28 Aug 2020)

Short summary

Soil aggregation is crucial for soil functioning. While the role of bacteria and fungi in soil aggregation is well established, how predators feeding on microbes modify soil aggregation has hardly been investigated. We showed for the first time that protists modify soil aggregation, presumably through changes in the production of bacterial mucilage, and that collembolans reduce soil aggregation, presumably by reducing the abundance of saprotrophic fungi.