Summary
Forest succession fundamentally reshapes soil biogeochemistry and the resident microbial communities, yet a synthesis of global response patterns has been hindered by methodological inconsistencies and conflicting regional findings. Through a meta-analysis of studies published from 2015 to 2025, we evaluated global patterns in soil properties, microbial communities across forest successional stages. We found that soil organic carbon (SOC) and total nitrogen (TN) increased significantly from early to late successional, while soil pH declined. Microbial α-diversity increased sharply from early to mid-succession before slightly declining in late stages. Structural equation modeling (SEM) indicated that TN is the primary positive driver of both bacterial and fungal diversity and community comp
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