Rising global temperatures reduce soil microbial diversity over the long term.

Authors

Yuan Sun, Han Y H Chen, Xin Chen, Masumi Hisano, Xinli Chen, Peter B Reich

Published in

Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. Volume 122. Issue 35. Pages e2426200122. Sep 02, 2025. Epub Aug 25, 2025.

Abstract

Soil microbial diversity is crucial to sustaining ecosystem productivity and improving carbon sequestration. Global temperature continues to rise, but how climate warming affects microbial diversity and its capacity to sequester soil organic carbon (SOC) remains uncertain. Here, by conducting a global meta-analysis with 251 paired observations from 102 studies, we showed that, on average, warming reduced bacterial and fungal diversity (measured by richness and Shannon index) by 16.0 and 19.7%, respectively, and SOC by 18.1%. The negative responses of both soil bacterial and fungal diversity to warming became more pronounced with increasing warming magnitude, experimental duration, and decreasing soil nitrogen availability. Under the worst-case climate warming scenario (2010 to 2070, 3.4 increase in °C), soil bacterial diversity and fungal diversity are projected to reduce by 56% and 81%, respectively, over 60 y. Importantly, in addition to the direct impact of warming on SOC, warming-induced declines in microbial diversity also contributed to SOC losses. We highlight that prolonged warming could substantially reduce soil microbial diversity and decrease SOC sequestration, accelerating future warming and underscoring the urgent need for decisive actions to mitigate global climate change.

PMID:
40854119
Bibliographic data and abstract were imported from PubMed on 26 Aug 2025.

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