The Effects of Plant-Soil-Enzyme Interactions on Plant Composition, Biomass and Diversity of Alpine Meadows in the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau

Table 4

Path analysis on CAB to soil C and soil enzyme activity.

Vegetation type	Factors	Decision coefficient	Direct path coefficient	Indirect path coefficient					Residual path coefficient
				Sum	X1	X3	X5	X6
K. humilis meadow	X1	0.9980	0.5514	–1.0813		–0.1062	–0.9303	–0.0448	0.0447
	X3		0.9041	–0.8618	–0.0648		–0.1141	–0.6829
	X5		1.442	–0.4759	–0.3557	–0.0716		–0.0486
	X6		–0.7558	0.9424	0.0327	0.8169	0.0928
				Sum	X1	X2	X4	X6
K. pygmaea meadow	X1	0.9982	–0.1287	–0.3535		–0.5273	0.3074	–0.1336	0.0425
	X2		1.6879	–0.8951	0.0402		–0.7847	–0.1506
	X4		1.3326	–1.8235	–0.0297	–0.9939		–0.7999
	X6		–1.247	1.0449	–0.0138	0.2039	0.8548
				Sum	X1	X3	X4	X5
K. tibetica swamp meadow	X1	0.9968	0.8422	0.1142		–0.0049	–0.2185	0.3376	0.0567
	X3		–0.7938	0.2236	0.2302		–0.1331	0.1265
	X4		0.5463	0.3561	–0.0869	0.169		0.274
	X5		-0.4195	–0.0984	0.0493	0.2092	–0.3569
				Sum	X1	X2	X3	X5
Potentilla fruticosa shrub meadow	X1	0.9906	1.6654	–2.1592		–0.8184	0.1685	–1.5093	0.0890
	X2		–1.2846	0.4194	1.0564		0.6073	–1.2443
	X3		–1.2521	1.8134	–0.2241	0.6231		1.4144
	X5		2.021	–1.3292	–1.2438	0.7909	–0.8763

Y: CAB, X₁: Soil organic carbon, X₂: Soil microbial biomass C, X₃: Urease, X₄: Protease, X₅: Alkali phosphatase, X₆: Invertase.