Soil microbial communities changed with a continuously monocropped processing tomato system

To reveal the regulatory mechanisms underlying the productivity of long-term continuous cropping of processing tomato, a multi-year study was carried out to understand the effects of long-term continuous cropping on the community structures of the root zone microbes. Soil samples collected from continuous cropping of processing tomato after 3, 5 and 7 years were used for this study. Results showed that soil microbial biomass C (SMBC), N (SMBN) and microbial quotient (qMB) significantly decreased with longer cropping. After seven years of continuous cropping, the SMBC and SMBN contents, and qMB respectively significantly decreased by 52.3%, 78.8% and 48.2% (p?