Microbial Associations of Alpine Plant Communities and Their Impact on Alpine Ecosystems

Dear Colleagues,

Alpine ecosystems are intriguing because of their stark beauty, their environmental extremes—resulting in specialized biota—and their vulnerability to anthropogenic effects, including global warming. Publications concerning the alpine have concentrated largely on alpine vegetation, a remarkable assembly of species, characterized by prostrate herbaceous perennials. Associated research topics have included physiological studies of individual plant species, interspecific interactions favored by low productivity environments, and the ecology of alpine plant communities. Largely missing from this work, however, are considerations of the microbiota and microbial processes whose ecology constrains the characteristics and long-term sustainability of alpine plant communities.

This Special Issue of Sustainability will attempt to synthesize current knowledge concerning the microbial (prokaryotic and eukaryotic) ecology of alpine plant communities. We encourage submissions of original research, meta-analyses, and reviews. Potential topics include but are not limited to:

• Integrated considerations of the synecology and autecology of plant/microbe communities;
• Theoretical considerations of alpine plant–microbial interactions;
• Controlled experiments focusing on alpine microbe–plant associations;
• Alpine plant–plant interactions mediated by microbes;
• Atmospheric and soil microbial communities and their association with particular alpine regions;
• Alpine nutrient (C, N, P) cycling, with a focus on plant–microbe connections.

Dr. Ken Aho
Dr. Yaqi You
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• alpine ecology
• alpine sustainability
• alpine nutrient cycling
• alpine community ecology
• plant ecology
• microbial ecology