Spatial patterns of microbial communities have been extensively surveyed in well-developed soils, but few studies investigated the vertical distribution of microorganisms in newly developed soils after glacier retreat. We used 454-pyrosequencing to assess whether bacterial and fungal community structures differed between stages of soil development (SSD) characterized by an increasing vegetation cover from barren (vegetation cover: 0%/ age: 10 years), sparsely-vegetated (13%/ 60 years), transient (60%/ 80 years) to vegetated (95%/ 110 years) and depths...