Soil abiotic variables are more important than Salicaceae phylogeny or habitat specialization in determining soil microbial community structure

Predicting the outcome of interspecific interactions is a central goal in ecology. The diverse soil microbes that interact with plants are shaped by different aspects of plant identity, such as phylogenetic history and functional group. Species interactions may also be strongly shaped by abiotic environment, but there is mixed evidence on the relative importance of environment, plant identity, and their interactions in shaping soil microbial communities. Using a multi-factor, split-plot field experiment, we tested how hydrologic context, and three facets of Salicaceae plant identity - habitat specialization, phylogenetic distance, and species identity - influence soil microbial community structure. Analysis of microbial community sequencing data with generalized dissimilarity models showed that abiotic environment explained up to 25% of variation in community composition of soil bacteria, fungi, and archaea, while Salicaceae identity influenced less than 1% of the variation in community..., OTU table, taxonomy, and sample data for doi:10.5061/dryad.5f24ks4This .RData image contains the Operational Taxonomic Unit (OTU) tables, OTU taxonomy, and sample metadata for each of the taxonomic groups and guilds analyzed in our paper. A phyloseq object combining the three datasets for fungi, bacteria, archaea, arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi, ectomycorrhizal fungi, saprotrophic fungi and pathogenic fungi are also provided. Please see the README file for descriptions of the data files.OTU_taxonomy_sample_data_10.5061dryad5f24ks4.RData16S raw otu table and taxonomy tableThis biom file contains the unrarefied otu table and taxonomy table of 16S reads. The matching sample data file is \"raw16S_sampledata.csv\". The READ ME file for the RData image contains all the explanations of the data files.raw16S_otus_tax.biomraw16S_sample_dataThis sample data corresponds to the raw 16S biom file. The data is described in the RData READ ME file.rawITS_otus_taxThis biom file contains the unrarefied ITS o...