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Available phosphorus and opportunistic pathogens drive geographic variation in Escherichia coli O157:H7 survival in soils across eastern China

Nature Food volume 6, pages 777–786 (2025)Cite this article

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Abstract

The persistence of food-borne pathogens in soil can trigger disease outbreaks, highlighting the critical need to understand their survival patterns. Here we investigate the survival of Escherichia coli O157:H7, a notable food-borne pathogen, across 81 natural soils from eastern China using inoculation experiments. E. coli O157:H7 survival ranged from 2.0 days to 43.3 days in soils. The survival-time map revealed hotspots and geographical heterogeneity of E. coli O157:H7 survival across eastern China. Bioinformatics analysis and validation experiments identified available phosphorus as the major factor controlling E. coli O157:H7 survival, with higher available phosphorus content in soils extending their survival. Two opportunistic pathogens, Enterococcus faecium and Aerococcus viridans, facilitated E. coli O157:H7 survival by forming biofilm structures and cross-feeding, respectively. Climate factors showed mostly indirect correlations with E. coli O157:H7. These findings enhance our understanding of food-borne pathogen survival in soils and offer insights to inform agricultural practices for preventing and controlling outbreaks.

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Fig. 1: Geographic heterogeneity of E. coli O157:H7 survival in eastern China (n = 81).
Fig. 2: Correlations of climate factors and soil physicochemical properties with E. coli O157:H7 survival time in soils (n = 39).
Fig. 3: Relationships between bacterial diversity, bacterial network, functional genes and E. coli O157:H7 survival time (n = 39).
Fig. 4: Validation experiments to assess abiotic and biotic factors and promotional mechanisms.
Fig. 5: Relationships between E. coli O157:H7 survival and biotic and abiotic factors.

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Data availability

The sequence data that support the findings of this study are available in the NCBI database as PRJNA1030546. Source data are provided with this paper.

Code availability

No custom code was developed for use in this paper. Code used for statistical analyses in this study is available via GitHub at https://github.com/zhangnan1997/Geographic-heterogeneity-and-drivers-of Escherichia-coli-O157-H7-survival-in-soils.

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Acknowledgements

We are grateful for the financial support of the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant numbers 41721001 to J. Xu, 423B2701 to N.Z. and 42090060 to B.M.). We thank X. Zhao, X. Zhang, X. Zheng and X. Yu of the Analysis Center of Agriculture, Life and Environment Sciences, Zhejiang University, for their technical assistance.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Soil and Water Resources and Environmental Science, College of Environmental and Resource Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China

    Jianming Xu, Nan Zhang, Zhiyuan Yao, Taoxiang Zhang, Jiajia Xing, Haizhen Wang, Zhiwen Jiang & Bin Ma

  2. State Key Laboratory of Soil Pollution Control and Safety, Zhejiang Provincial Key Laboratory of Agricultural Resources and Environment, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China

    Jianming Xu, Nan Zhang, Haizhen Wang & Bin Ma

  3. Department of Land, Air and Water Resources, University of California, Davis, CA, USA

    Randy A. Dahlgren

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  1. Jianming Xu
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Contributions

J. Xu acquired funding and contributed to the experimental design, study supervision, soil collection, interpretation of the results, and writing, review and editing. N.Z. acquired funding and contributed to the writing, data analysis, figure visualization and validation experiments. Z.Y. contributed to the soil collection and physicochemical characterization. T.Z. contributed to the soil collection and physicochemical characterization. J. Xing contributed to the investigation and formal analysis. H.W. contributed to the review. Z.J. contributed to the investigation. R.A.D. contributed to the review and editing. B.M. acquired funding and contributed to the soil collection, data analysis and review.

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Correspondence to Jianming Xu.

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Xu, J., Zhang, N., Yao, Z. et al. Available phosphorus and opportunistic pathogens drive geographic variation in Escherichia coli O157:H7 survival in soils across eastern China. Nat Food 6, 777–786 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s43016-025-01191-2

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