Life-history strategies of soil microorganisms and their interactions with plant diversity: a review.

Abstract

Faced with the global challenges of biodiversity loss and soil function degradation across ecosystems, deciphering the synergistic mechanisms between soil microorganisms and plant diversity is essential for supporting ecological restoration and sustainable development. This study reviews the evolutionary progression of microbial life-history strategies, from the r-K dichotomy to the CSR/CSO and YAS frameworks, and onward to multidimensional modern frameworks, revealing their central role in driving microbial ecological adaptation. Focusing on the evolution and drivers of microbial life-history strategies, this work synthesizes plant-microbe interactions in grassland ecosystems, which are globally extensive, highly responsive to management and climate, and central to restoration practice. Evidence from forests and croplands is used only where it clarifies a general mechanism or its boundary of applicability. It further addresses these relationships within grassland ecosystems, elucidating the coevolutionary dynamics between plants and microorganisms and the divergent microbial life-history strategies shaped by dominant plant functional groups including grasses and legumes. This review synthesizes current evidence linking microbial life-history strategies with plant diversity and functional-group composition in grasslands. It discusses how plant inputs, soil resource availability, environmental stress, and management practices may shape microbial traits and plant-microbe interactions. By distinguishing experimentally supported mechanisms from observational associations and conceptual hypotheses, this review identifies potential applications in grassland restoration and highlights the methodological limitations that must be addressed before microbial life-history strategies can be used as operational indicators of restoration outcomes.