Microbial functional taxa promote soil multifunctionality in naturally restoring subalpine meadows

Understanding how microbial communities impact soil multifunctionality is crucial to restoration and management of degraded ecosystems. Previous studies have primarily focused on the linkage between soil multifunctionality and community biodiversity, neglecting the community composition and functional taxa. In this study, we investigated the dynamics of soil multifunctionality, soil microbial communities, and their functional taxa during 30 years restoration of subalpine meadows by replacing the temporal changes with spatial changes. Results indicated that soil multifunctionality decreased and then increased along the meadow restoration chronosequence, where soil water content and nitrogen availability increased significantly, and the relative abundance of functional taxa (from bacterial to protozoan taxa) of microbial community remarkably changed. We found that soil multifunctionality was more positively associated with community composition and functional taxa rather than microbial diversity, and higher trophic level predators, e.g. protozoan, and producers, e.g. alga played important roles in soil multifunctionality. The studies provided insights into the important roles of soil microbial functional taxa in maintaining ecosystem functioning, highlighting the necessity of considering potential functional taxa in ecosystem restoration, rather than solely focusing on species diversity. • Soil multifunctionality increased nonlinearly with the natural restoration of subalpine meadow. • Meadow restoration reshaped soil microbial community. • Specific microbial groups and plant diversity jointly determined soil multifunctionality.