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Under the threat of global warming it is vital to determine the impact that future changes in climate may have on the environment and to what extent any adverse effects can be mitigated. In this research an assessment was carried out on the impact that climate trends may have on soil erosion and contaminant transport in India and examined the potential for top soil management practices to improve or maintain soil quality. Historical rainfall data from 50-135 years and extreme temperature data for 103 years were analysed and long term trends were assessed for various aspects of Indian climates using suitable statistical techniques. Results indicated that intra-region variability for extreme monsoon seasonal rainfall is large and mostly exhibited a negative tendency leading to increasing frequency and magnitude of monsoon rainfall deficit and decreasing frequency and magnitude of monsoon rainfall excess everywhere in India except in the peninsular Indian region. This is further exacerbated by increased and more variable extreme temperatures. Intra-region rainfall variability in India is linked to the pacific Southern Oscillation, where the associations of monsoon drought and El-Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) in the regions near to coast are greatest. 50-years high resolution daily gridded rainfall data was analysed to set up certain indices for the extreme daily rainfalls to assess their changes for the six gridded regions of Kerala, the extreme south western state of India where monsoon rainfall initiates every year. This was also done for two study sites, namely Bhoj wetland area of west central India and Sukinda chromite mining site of central north east India. Significant decrease was found in monsoon and spring rainfall extremes and increase in winter and autumn rainfall extremes in Kerala that would affect the tendency of change in seasonal total rainfall as well. Decrease in monsoon rainfall in Kerala also indicate that monsoon rainfall is decreasing in India as a whole, increased occurrence of floods is expected in winter and autumn seasons, together with water scarcity are expected to be felt both in spring and monsoon seasons with a delaying monsoon onset in Kerala. Soil erosion studies were conducted for two northern most gridded regions of Kerala as an extended work of the related MPhil study, and contaminant transport with eroded sediments was looked at for the Bhoj and Sukinda sites using RUSLE2 model software and other suitable numerical methods. It was found that soil erosion depended on a complex interaction of climate, soil properties, topography, and cover management. An assessment on extreme climate patterns for Bhoj and Sukinda showed an increasing tendency of seasonal and annual rainfall extremes and temperatures leading to an increasing pattern of soil erosion at both the sites. However, a certain consensus was difficult to reach because of the complex interaction of climate and soil carbon that is a very important deciding factor for soil erosion potential. Vegetative cover and plant residue was found providing essential soil nutrients, enhancing soil properties and retarding rainfall impact on bare top soil leading to reduction of soil erosion. Therefore, a soil erosion and contaminant transport prevention plan should take care of the top soil such that it is not kept bare especially when rainfall intensity is high in a given year. This work as a whole has highlighted the importance of regional climatological analysis with the large scale spatial averages especially at local decision making level, which is very useful for the broad scenarios such as climatological and ecological risk management.

Failure of slopes adjacent to the UK transport infrastructure causes delays and these are expensive assets to repair and maintain. Understanding the processes that lead to failure will assist asset managers both now and in the future in the context of a changing climate. The EPSRC-funded multidisciplinary FUTURENET project investigated the effect of climate change on the resilience of the UK transport network and this thesis is a part of that project considering the weather patterns leading to slope failures along transport infrastructure slopes within the UK. To that end a series of slope failure case studies were investigated to understand the processes leading to failure. These were compiled using nationally held datasets as well as news reports. This research used data from the FUTURENET partners that hold national data sets and asset management information. This shows the wide reaching remit of a multidisciplinary collaborative project such as FUTURENET, but also highlights the limitations of datasets collected and used for very specific purposes and not necessarily suited to wider research. From these case studies a suite of slope failure weather thresholds were developed. These thresholds consider the antecedent period, water content within the slope through the soil moisture deficit and triggering rainfall through comparison to the long term average rainfall. Consideration was given to possible future weather using weather event sequences (WESQs), possible weather patterns for 2050 derived from the UKCP09 climate projection data. By considering these possible weather patterns with the slope failure thresholds a picture of a possible future was evaluated.

Soils and plant microbial communities are intricately linked to ecosystem functioning as they play important roles in nutrients dynamics as decomposers and feedback to plant communities as mutualists and pathogens. Numerous soil physicochemical factors as well as the land use management are shaping the composition and dynamics of microbial community. In addition, global warming and climate change are the most prominent of all environmental factors that influence all kinds of the living organisms including microbes associated to the plant soil systems. A better understanding of the environmental drivers shaping these microbial communities especially under future climate will help to understand and predict the expected changes of ecosystems functions and accordingly of the services they provide. In addition, such knowledge will help to detect potential ways on how soil microorganisms can be harnessed to help mitigating the negative consequences of climate change.The Global Change Experimental Facility (GCEF) is settled in the field research station of the Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ) in Bad Lauchstädt, Saxony-Anhalt, Germany (51_22’60 N, 11_50’60 E, 118 m a.s.l.). This facility has been designed to investigate the consequences of a predicted future climate scenario expected in 50-70 years in Central Germany on ecosystem processes under different land-use regimes applied on large field plots in comparison to similar sets of plots under the ambient climate. We performed our study using this research facility, with the aim to analyze the impact of future climate conditions, soil physicochemical factors, and/or land use type and intensity on microbial communities in different habitats (rhizosphere soil, plant endosphere, and plant residues) in grassland and cropland ecosystems. To assess the microbial communities, we used the highly sensitive and powerful highthroughput next generation sequencing, Illumina Miseq.This thesis constitutes the first assessment of microbial communities in the GCEF experimental facility. The samples were collected in 2015 for manuscript 4, while for manuscripts 1, 2, 3, 5, 6, the samples were collected in 2018-2019. Manuscript 1: (Sansupa, Wahdan, Hossen et al., 2021; Applied Science 2021, 11, 688) “Can we use functional annotation of prokaryotic taxa (FAPROTAX) to assign the ecological functions of investigated the potential use of FAPROTAX for bacterial functional annotation in non-aquatic ecosystems, specifically in soil. For this study, we used microbial datasets of soil systems including rhizosphere soil of Trifolium pratense from the extensively used meadow plots in the GCEF. We hypothesized that FAPROTAX can be used in terrestrial ecosystems. Our survey revealed that FAPROTAX tool can be used for screening or grouping of 16S derived bacterial data from terrestrial ecosystems and its performance could be enhanced through improving the taxonomic and functional reference databases. Manuscript 2: (Wahdan et al., 2021; Frontiers in Microbiology 12:629169) “Targeting the active rhizosphere microbiome of Trifolium pratense in grassland evidences a stronger-than-expected belowground biodiversity-ecosystem functioning link”. In this study, we used the bromodeoxyuridine (BrdU) immunocapture technique combined with pair-end Illumina sequencing to differentiate between total and active microbiomes (including both bacteria and fungi) in the rhizosphere of T. pratense. In the same rhizosphere soil samples, we also measured the activities of three microbial extracellular hydrolytic enzymes, (ß-glucosidase, N-acetylglucosaminidase, and acid phosphatase), which play central roles in the C, N, and P acquisition. We investigated the proportion of active and total rhizosphere microbiomes, and their responses to the manipulated future climate in the GCEF. In addition, we identified the possible links between total and active microbiomes and the soil ecosystem function (extracellular enzyme production). Our results revealed that the active microbes of the rhizosphere represented 42.8 and 32.1% of the total bacterial and fungal operational taxonomic units (OTUs), respectively. Active and total microbial fractions were taxonomically and functionally diverse and displayed different responses to variations of soil physicochemical factors. We also showed that the richness of overall and specific functional groups of active microbes in rhizosphere soil significantly correlated with the measured enzyme activities, while total microbial richness did not. Manuscript 3: (Wahdan et al., 2021; Microbiology Open 10:e1217) “Deciphering Trifolium pratense L. (red clover) holobiont reveals a resistant microbial community assembly to future climate changes predicted for the next 50–70 years”. We investigated the microbial communities of bacteria and fungi associated with four plant parts of T. pratense (the rhizosphere and the endopheres of the roots, whole shoot system (leaves and stems), and of the flower) and evaluated their potential ecological and metabolic functions in response to future climate conditions. This study was performed on the GCEF extensively managed grassland plots. Our analyses indicated that plant tissue/compartments differentiation enables the formation of a unique ecological niches that harbor specific microbial communities. Except for the fungal communities of the aboveground compartments, T. pratense microbiome diversity and community composition showed a resistance against the future climate changes. We also analyzed the predicted bacterial metabolic functional genes of red clover. Thereby, we detected microbial genes involved in plant growth processes, such as biofertilisation (nitrogen fixation, phosphorus solubilisation, and siderophore biosynthesis) and biostimulation (phytohormone and auxin production), which were not influenced by the future climate. Manuscript 4: (Wahdan et al., 2021; Environmental Microbiology) “Organic agricultural practice enhances arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis in correspondence to soil warming and altered precipitation patterns”. This study was performed on the conventional and organic farming plots under both ambient and future climate conditions. We evaluated the effect of climate (ambient vs. future), agricultural practice (conventional vs. organic farming) and their interaction on Arbuscular Mycorrhizal Fungi (AMF) community composition and richness inside wheat roots. In addition, we evaluated the relationship between molecular richness of indigenous root AMF and wheat yield parameters. Future climate altered the total AMF community composition and a sub-community of Glomeraceae. Further, application of different agricultural practices altered both total AMF and Glomeraceae community, whereby organic farming appeared to enhance total AMF and Diversisporaceae richness. Under the future climate scenario, organic farming enhanced total AMF and Gigasporaceae richness in comparison with conventional farming. Our results revealed a positive correlation between AMF richness and wheat nutrient contents not only in organic farming system but also under conventionally managed fields. Manuscript 5: (Wahdan et al., 2020; Microorganisms 8, 908) “Future climate significantly alters fungal plant pathogen dynamics during the early phase of wheat litter decomposition”. This study was performed on the conventional farming plots. We investigated the structure and ecological functions of fungal communities colonizing wheat during the early phase of decomposition (0, 30, and 60 days) under current and future climate conditions. We found that plant pathogenic fungi dominated (~87% of the total sequences) within the wheat residue mycobiome. Destructive wheat fungal pathogens such as Fusarium graminearum, Fusarium tricinctum, and Zymoseptoria tritci were detected under ambient and future climates. Additionally, the future climate brought new pathogens to the system. Manuscript 6: (Wahdan et al., 2021; Microbial Ecology 10.1007/s00248-021-01840-6) “Life in the wheat litter: effects of future climate on microbiome and function during the early phase of decomposition”. This study was performed on the conventional farming plots. We assessed the effects of climate change on microbial richness, community compositions, interactions and their functions (production of extracellular enzymes) in decomposing residues of wheat. In addition, we investigated the effects of climate change on litter residues physicochemical factors as well as on mass loss during the early phase of decomposition. Future climate significantly accelerated litter mass loss as compared with ambient one. Our results indicated that future climate significantly increased fungal richness and altered fungal communities over time, while bacterial communities were more resistant in wheat residues. Fungi corresponded to different physicochemical elements of litter under ambient (C, Ca2+ and pH) and future (C/N, N, P, K+, Ca2+ and pH) climate conditions. Also, a highly correlative interactions between richness of bacteria and fungi were detected under future climate. Activities of microbial β-glucosidase and N-acetylglucosaminidase in wheat straw were significantly higher under future climate. Such high enzymatic activities were coupled with a significant positive correlation between microbial (both bacteria and fungi) richness and community compositions with these two enzymatic activities only under future climate.:CONTENTS BIBLIOGRAPHIC DESCRIPTION……………………………………………….......III ZUSAMMENFASSUNG………………………………………………………...........V SUMMARY……………………………………………………………………………..X GENERAL INTRODUCTION…………………………………………………………………...............1 I-1 Ecosystem functions carried out by soil and plant microbiomes…………………..2 I-2 Biodiversity and functional diversity and maintenance of ecosystem functions……………..3 I-3 Total vs. active microbial diversity for assessing ecosystem functions……………4 I-4 Factors influencing soil and plant microbiota…………………………………..……6 I-4.1 Elements of climate changes……………………………………………................7 I-4.2 Climate changes influence microbes in an interacting, complex manner………8 I-4.3 Environmental factors controlling the response of microorganisms to climate changes………………………………………………………………………………….....10 I-5 Interplay between climate and land use intensity in agroecosystems……………11 I-6 Study site, and overall objectives………………………………………………....…12 I-7 Methods used for the taxonomic and functional characterization of the microbiomes……...15 I-8 Presentation of aims and hypotheses of the publications/manuscripts in different chapters.................................................................................................................16 I-9References.........................................................................................................20 CHAPTER 1 Can we use functional annotation of prokaryotic taxa (FAPROTAX) to assign the ecological functions of soil bacteria? .....................................................................29 Publication…………………………………………………………………………...........31 Supplementary materials…………………………………………………………….......42 CHAPTER 2 Targeting the active rhizosphere microbiome of Trifolium pratense in grassland evidences a stronger-than-expected belowground biodiversity-ecosystem functioning link………………..........................................................................…49 Publication………………………………………………………………………………51 Supplementary materials……………………………………………………………..67 CHAPTER 3 Deciphering Trifolium pratense L. holobiont reveals a microbiome resilient to future climate changes……………………………………………….…………………………..89 Publication………………………………………………………………………………….91 Supplementary materials……………………………………………………………….111 CHAPTER 4 Organic agricultural practice enhances arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis in correspondence to soil warming and altered precipitation patterns………………125 Publication……………………………………………………………………………….127 Supplementary materials………………………………………………………….......140 CHAPTER 5 Future climate significantly alters fungal plant pathogen dynamics during the early phase of wheat litter decomposition…...................………………….……………..156 Publication………………………………………………...…………….….…………...158 Supplementary materials………………………………………………….…....……..175 CHAPTER 6 Life in the wheat litter: effects of future climate on microbiome and function during the early phase of decomposition…………………………………….....……....…….181 Publication…………………………………..…………………………………….....…...183 Supplementary materials………………………………………………………………..199 GENERAL DISCUSSION…………………………………………………………….......210 D-I Approaches and main findings of the result chapters………………………..…211 D-2 Conclusion and implications of the study findings…………………………...…215 D-3 Technical limitation of the study……………………………………………......…217 D-4 Future prospects of the study field ...……………………………………………217 D-5 References…………………………………………………………………………..219 DATA AVAILABILITY……………………………………………………………………...223 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS……………………………………………………………......224 CURRICULUM VITAE……………………………………………………………….....…225 LIST OF PUBLICATIONS………………………………………………………….........226 CONFERENCE PROCEEDINGS…………………………………………………….....227 STATUTORY DECLARATION………………………………………………................228 VERIFICATION OF AUTHOR PARTS……………………………………………........229

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The aim of the thesis is the identification and characterization of soils with andic properties using the magnetic methods. Investigated soil is located in the Velký Roudný in the Nízký Jeseník mountain. This is the only known area with Andosols on the territory of the Czech Republic. Magnetic measurements will be performed both in the field and in the laboratory, and will be accomplished by geochemical analyses necessary for accurate pedological characterisation. Magnetic data will be interpreted in termagnetická susceptibilita of the geological and environmental conditions. The results will be compared with the properties of the Andosols from the French Massif Central.

Accurate prediction of mortality is an important component of forest growth and yield prediction systems, yet mortality remains one of the least understood components of the system. Whole-stand and individual-tree mortality models were developed for loblolly pine plantations throughout its geographic range in the United States. The model for predicting stand mortality were developed using stand characteristics and biophysical variables. The models were constructed using two modeling approaches. In the first approach, mortality functions for directly predicting tree number reduction were developed using algebraic difference equation method. In the second approach, a two-step modeling strategy was used where a model predicting the probability of tree death occurring over a period was developed in the first step and a function that estimates the reduction in tree number was developed in the second step. Individual-tree mortality models were developed using multilevel logistic regression and survival analysis techniques. Multilevel data structure inherent in permanent sample plots data i.e. measurement occasions nested within trees (e.g., repeated measurements) and trees nested within plots, is often ignored in modeling tree mortality in forestry applications. Multilevel mixed-effects logistic regression takes into account the full hierarchical structure of the data. Multilevel mixed-effects models gave better predictions than the fixed effects model; however, the model fits and predictions were further improved by taking into account the full hierarchical structure of the data. Semiparametric proportional hazards regression was also used to develop model for individual-tree mortality. Shared frailty model, mixed model extension of Cox proportional hazards model, was used to account for unobserved heterogeneity not explained by the observed covariates in the Cox model. / Ph. D.