Molecular Soil Biology 2026, Vol.17, No.1, 38-50 http://bioscipublisher.com/index.php/msb 47 Future applications may combine bio-organic amendments with precision microbiome engineering to establish stable, disease-suppressive soils adapted to intensive greenhouse conditions. This approach requires comprehensive understanding of microbe-microbe and plant-microbe interactions within the complex rhizosphere environment. Integrating multi-omics technologies with ecological modeling will facilitate the identification of keystone taxa critical for ecosystem function and guide effective interventions (Wang et al., 2024). Overall, microecological regulation represents a sustainable strategy to enhance productivity while mitigating the negative impacts of continuous cucumber monoculture in greenhouses. 8 Conclusions and Future Research Directions Continuous cucumber monocropping in greenhouse systems leads to significant shifts in soil microbial communities, characterized by decreased bacterial and fungal diversity alongside altered community composition. Key bacterial phyla such as Actinobacteria tend to decline, while Acidobacteria, Firmicutes, Chloroflexi, and Gemmatimonadetes increase with prolonged cropping duration. Similarly, fungal communities show an increase in Ascomycota abundance, often linked to pathogenicity, while beneficial fungi such as Chaetomium and Mortierella decrease over time. These microbial changes coincide with soil physicochemical alterations including reduced pH, increased electrical conductivity, and accumulation of organic matter and nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus. The restructuring of microbial networks also reflects weakened species interactions and reduced ecosystem stability under long-term monoculture. Moreover, continuous cropping negatively impacts functional groups involved in nutrient cycling and disease suppression. Beneficial genera such as Bacillus and Sphingomonas decline, which correlates with reduced enzyme activities critical for soil health. Soil metabolic functions related to amino acid biosynthesis and fatty acid metabolism are also disrupted as cropping years increase. These microbial and functional shifts contribute to soil sickness symptoms observed in cucumber production systems, including yield decline and increased disease incidence. Overall, the evidence indicates that continuous cucumber cropping induces a complex cascade of biotic and abiotic changes that undermine soil quality and sustainability. Despite advances in understanding microbial responses to continuous cucumber cropping, several limitations remain in current research. Most studies focus on taxonomic shifts using high-throughput sequencing but provide limited insight into the functional roles of altered microbial communities or their direct effects on plant health. Functional predictions based on marker genes or metabolomics remain preliminary, necessitating more integrative multi-omics approaches to elucidate microbe-mediated mechanisms underlying continuous cropping obstacles. Additionally, many investigations are region-specific with variable soil types and management practices, limiting the generalizability of findings across diverse greenhouse systems. Temporal dynamics beyond a few years are insufficiently explored; long-term monitoring is needed to capture progressive microbial succession and resilience potential. Furthermore, interactions between microbes, plants, and environmental factors such as soil chemistry require deeper mechanistic studies to identify keystone taxa or metabolites driving system stability or degradation. Finally, practical strategies for microbiome manipulation remain underdeveloped due to incomplete knowledge of how introduced amendments or crop rotations reshape native communities sustainably. Addressing these gaps will be critical for developing effective interventions that restore soil health and productivity in continuous cucumber greenhouse cultivation. Acknowledgments I extend my sincere gratitude to the anonymous reviewers for their valuable and insightful comments, which have greatly strengthened this paper. Conflict of Interest Disclosure The author affirms that this research was conducted without any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest. References Bai Z., Jia A., Li H., Wang M., and Qu S., 2023, Explore the soil factors driving soil microbial community and structure in Songnen alkaline salt degraded grassland, Frontiers in Plant Science, 14: 1110685. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpls.2023.1110685
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