Soil microbial community responses to heat wave components: drought and high temperature

ABSTRACT: Heat waves, defined as events associating high temperatures with severe drought, are expected to become increasingly recurrent. Research has focused heavily on the impacts of drought and temperature increase on soil functioning and microbial diversity, but little attention has been paid to soil microbial community responses to combined heat-drought stresses. Heat waves, which combine heat and drought stresses, may induce different microbial responses to those observed in studies focusing on heat or drought alone. Microbial recovery strategies to withstand heat-drought conditions, along with patterns of microbial functional redundancy and complex interactions with the soil physical-chemical-biological interface may have marked effects on soil ecosystem functioning, particularly in agroecosystems through the rhizosphere. To better understand how heat waves affect soil ecosystem functioning, we advocate the development of mechanistic approaches integrating individual to community level and biophysicochemical studies on the indirect effects of combined heat-drought stresses in microbial communities, observed through soil environment parameters in experimental and field studies. The challenge will be to define trait-based functional indicators of the microbial community response to heat waves, particularly the potential interrelatedness between the traits responsible for tolerance to drought and heat.