Fig. 3: Conceptual diagram showing the biogeography of microbial growth rates.

The partial least squares path model depicts factors influencing microbial potential growth rates through direct and indirect pathways. Blue and red arrows indicate positive and negative effects, respectively, while the indicated values on the arrows are the path coefficients for the inner model. The path coefficients for outer models of the partial least squares path modeling are shown in Supplementary Table 1. C is carbon, N is nitrogen, and P is phosphorus. The soil microbiome in acid-neutral soils with high organic matter and nutrients (resource-rich) in humid regions, dominated by Basidiomycota, Acidobacteriota, and Proteobacteria, exhibits a large genome size and low biomass C:P and N:P ratios, indicating a high potential growth rate. Conversely, in resource-poor, dry, and hypersaline soils, the microbiome, dominated by Ascomycota, Actinobacteriota, and Gemmatimonadota, displays a lower potential growth rate, suggesting that resource acquisition and stress tolerance tradeoff with growth rate. Source data are provided as a Source Data file.