Alkaline phosphatase-harboring bacterial community and multiple enzyme activity contribute to phosphorus transformation during vegetable waste and chicken manure composting

The objective of this study was to evaluate changes in phosphorus fractions during vegetable waste and chicken manure composting. High throughput sequencing, quantitative PCR, and multiple analysis methods were applied to investigate interconnections among phosphorus fractions, enzyme activity, and phoD-harboring bacterial community composition. We found the highest composting temperature reached 61 °C and phosphorus fractions presented significant differences during a 60-day composting. The content of plant-absorbable phosphorus, including water soluble phosphorus, available phosphorus, and citric acid phosphorus increased by 121%, 87%, and 63%, respectively. Additionally, phoD gene abundance significantly correlated with the activities of nine enzymes. Our findings emphasize that microbial activity plays an important role in phosphorus transformation during composting, and the final composting product could be good biological phosphorus fertilizer. To our knowledge, this is the first report indicating that enzyme activity, community composition and abundance of phoD-harboring bacteria have direct and indirect effects on phosphorus transformation during composting.