Emerging Patterns of Microbial Functional Traits

Functional traits are measurable characteristics that affect an organism’s fitness under certain environmental conditions. The use of functional traits in microbial ecology holds great promise for improving our ability to develop biogeochemical models and predict ecosystem responses to global changes. Notably, functional traits could be decoupled from taxonomic relatedness, owing to horizontal gene transfer among microorganisms and adaptive evolution. In recent years, our knowledge about microbial functional traits has been substantially enhanced, thereby revealing the multitude of ecological processes in driving community assembly and dynamics. Here, I summarize the emerging patterns of how microbial functional traits respond to changing environments, which considerably differ from better-studied microbial taxonomy. I use niche and neutral theories to explain microbial functional traits. Finally, I highlight future challenges to analyze, elucidate, and utilize functional traits in microbial ecology. To understand the cause of microbial community dynamics and ecosystem consequences, scientists must analyze the patterns of microbial functional traits under various environmental conditions and associate functional traits with ecosystem processes.Challenges in cultivation and trait measurement, lack of robust definition of microbial species, and ecological incoherence of the microbial world have disallowed the direct application of trait concepts and tools developed for macro-organisms.In addition to serving as next-generation biomonitoring tools for assessing environmental safety and health risks, microbial functional traits could be used to explain biogeochemical cycling and improve ecosystem modeling.More research programs are needed for generating a knowledge base of functional traits, a critical step for environmental biomonitoring and biogeochemical process modeling in a time of rapid global changes.