As a key nitrogen (N) source, soil amino acids play an important role in plant N nutrition. However, how amino acids differentially influence the N use strategies of native and invasive plants remains unclear. We performed a potted experiment using five pairs of native and invasive plant congeners, which were subject to 23 N treatments (i.e., 20 protein primary amino acids, nitrate, ammonium, and control), each with 10 replicates. We determined their growth, biomass allocation, N use efficiency, and the growth advantage of plant invaders over their natives. Native and invasive plants used the same 18 amino acid N sources (i.e., a similar amino acid economics spectrum). The growth of plant invaders was invariably better than the growth of native plants, and this superior growth of invaders was linked to their higher root biomass allocation and greater N use efficiency. Additionally, invasive plants had a greater growth advantage on amino acid N than on inorganic N, so was this advantage greater on neutral amino acids than on acidic amino acids. These findings suggest that the differences in amino acid use strategies between invasive and native congeners could help to explain plant invasiveness, as indicated by a growth advantage.

作为重要的氮源，土壤氨基酸在植物氮素营养中起着重要的作用。但是，氨基酸如何差异影响天然植物和入侵植物的氮利用策略仍不清楚。我们使用五对天然和入侵植物同源物进行了盆栽实验，对它们进行了23 N处理（即20种蛋白质一级氨基酸，硝酸盐，铵和对照），每组重复10次。我们确定了它们的生长，生物量分配，氮的利用效率，以及植物入侵者相对于本地植物的生长优势。天然植物和入侵植物使用相同的18个氨基酸N源（即相似的氨基酸经济学谱）。植物入侵者的生长总是比本地植物的生长好，入侵者的这种优异生长与他们更高的根生物量分配和更高的氮利用效率有关。另外，入侵植物在氨基酸N上比在无机N上具有更大的生长优势，因此在中性氨基酸上比在酸性氨基酸上具有更大的优势。这些发现表明，入侵基因和天然同类物在氨基酸利用策略上的差异可以帮助解释植物的入侵性，这具有增长优势。