An important new research paper, titled “Response of Sediment Bacterial Communities to Sudden Vegetation Dieback in a Coastal Wetland,” examines the consequences of plant disappearance and changes in salt marsh soil communities following Sudden Vegetation Dieback (SVD).
The paper, published in Phytobiomes, an open-access journal of The American Phytopathological Society, is written by Wade Elmer, Peter Thiel, and Blaire Steven, scientists at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station in New Haven. The setting for this study was the marshes of Connecticut’s Hammonasset Beach State Park.
An important new research paper, titled “Response of Sediment Bacterial Communities to Sudden Vegetation Dieback in a Coastal Wetland,” examines the consequences of plant disappearance and changes in salt marsh soil communities following Sudden Vegetation Dieback (SVD).
The paper, published in Phytobiomes, an open-access journal of The American Phytopathological Society, is written by Wade Elmer, Peter Thiel, and Blaire Steven, scientists at the Connecticut Agricultural Experiment Station in New Haven. The setting for this study was the marshes of Connecticut’s Hammonasset Beach State Park.
These marshes, which produce large amounts of plant biomass, have been beneficial to Connecticut’s coastal ecosystems by providing protection from erosion, habitats for native birds and fish, and absorption of fertilizer runoff.
Recently and with no clear cause, these marshes and others on the Atlantic coast were severely affected by SVD. The issue: a rapid death of the dominant marshgrass, Spartina alterniflora.
Continue reading at The American Phytopathological Society
Photo: Authors Wade Elmer, Peter Thiel, and Blaire Steven of the first published article in the new Phytobiomes journal.
Photo credit: The American Phytopathological Society
