Warming increases microbial residue contribution to soil organic carbon in an alpine meadow

Ding, Xigui; Chen, Shengyun; Zhang, Bin; Liang, Chao; He, Hongbo; Horwáth, William R.

doi:10.1016/j.soilbio.2019.04.004

Cited by 121 publications

(62 citation statements)

References 58 publications

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“…Similar to our results, Ding et al. (2019) found elevated temperature significantly increased the accumulation of microbial necromass in an alpine meadow soil. Therefore, although future climate warming might decrease the pool size of SOM, it might increase the proportion of microbially derived SOM and its accumulation in MAOM, thereby changing the structure and persistence of SOM.…”

Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 93%

Elevated temperature increases the accumulation of microbial necromass nitrogen in soil via increasing microbial turnover

Wang

Cotrufo

et al. 2020

Global Change Biology

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Microbial-derived nitrogen (N) is now recognized as an important source of soil organic N. However, the mechanisms that govern the production of microbial necromass N, its turnover, and stabilization in soil remain poorly understood. To assess the effects of elevated temperature on bacterial and fungal necromass N production, turnover, and stabilization, we incubated 15 N-labeled bacterial and fungal necromass under optimum moisture conditions at 10°C, 15°C, and 25°C. We developed a new 15 N tracing model to calculate the production and mineralization rates of necromass N. Our results showed that bacterial and fungal necromass N had similar mineralization rates, despite their contrasting chemistry. Most bacterial and fungal necromass 15 N was recovered in the mineral-associated organic matter fraction through microbial anabolism, suggesting that mineral association plays an important role in stabilizing necromass N in soil, independently of necromass chemistry. Elevated temperature significantly increased the accumulation of necromass N in soil, due to the relatively higher microbial turnover and production of necromass N with increasing temperature than the increases in microbial necromass N mineralization. In conclusion, we found elevated temperature may increase the contribution of microbial necromass N to mineral-stabilized soil organic N.

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Section: Discussionsupporting

confidence: 93%

Elevated temperature increases the accumulation of microbial necromass nitrogen in soil via increasing microbial turnover

Wang

Cotrufo

et al. 2020

Global Change Biology

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“…This suggests that the increase in temperature may raise the MAT above the biological threshold for plant growth in the higher latitude region. Vegetation inputs, in turn, could offset carbon loss caused by other factors (Ding et al, 2019; Giardina et al, 2014), particularly in high latitudes characterized by a wet and cold climate.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Climate Change Dominated Long‐Term Soil Carbon Losses of Inner Mongolian Grasslands

Xin

Jin

et al. 2020

Global Biogeochemical Cycles

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Soil organic carbon (SOC) is the most critical component of global carbon cycle in grassland ecosystems. There has been growing interest in understanding SOC dynamics and driving forces of grassland biomes at various temporal and spatial scales. Up to now, estimates of long-term and large-scale changes in SOC of grassland biomes have been mostly based on modeling approaches and manipulative experiments, rather than direct measurements. During 2007-2011, we repeated 141 soil profiles of the sampling in 1963-1964 (up to 1-m depth) to quantify the long-term changes of SOC storage in the major grassland types of Inner Mongolia in order to tease apart the relative contributions of climate change and grazing. We found that SOC decreased in all soil types, except in the eolian sandy soils, from 1963 to 2007, with an average reduction rate of 1.8 kg C m −2 (~22.9% or 0.52% year −1) in the grassland biome of Inner Mongolia. We quantitatively clustered the soils into four groups using principal component analysis (PCA) and detected clear spatial dependency of the changes on climate and grazing. The climate change was responsible for 15.3-34.9% of the total SOC variations, whereas grazing intensity accounted for <9.5% of the changes. Our findings indicated that climate change, rather than grazing, was the primary forcing for the changes in SOC of Inner Mongolia grasslands. We presume that other driving forces, such as changes in nongrazing-resultant wind erosion and atmospheric nitrogen deposition, might have played a role albeit their effects need to be further examined.

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“…Better region‐specific estimates are also needed for microbial responses to climate change for making credible policy recommendations and reducing uncertainty. For example, it is likely that warming not only destabilizes microbial necromass causing its significant decline in California grasslands (Liang & Balser, ) but may also lead to enhanced necromass storage via stimulating microbial growth and necromass accumulation in high‐elevation ecosystems (Ding et al, ). The unknown optimum for maximizing global carbon storage likely depends on soil order, proximal climate, the availability of other carbon and nutrient sources, management, and the velocity and efficiency of related C stabilization processes.…”

Section: Actions For Future Researchmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Better region-specific estimates are also needed for microbial responses to climate change for making credible policy recommendations and reducing uncertainty. For example, it is likely that warming not only destabilizes microbial necromass causing its significant decline in California grasslands (Liang & Balser, 2012) but may also lead to enhanced necromass storage via stimulating microbial growth and necromass accumulation in high-elevation ecosystems (Ding et al, 2019).…”

Section: Ac Ti On S For Future Re S E Archmentioning

confidence: 99%

Quantitative assessment of microbial necromass contribution to soil organic matter

Liang

Amelung

Lehmann

et al. 2019

Global Change Biology

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931

452

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Soil carbon transformation and sequestration have received significant interest in recent years due to a growing need for quantitating its role in mitigating climate change. Even though our understanding of the nature of soil organic matter has recently been substantially revised, fundamental uncertainty remains about the quantitative importance of microbial necromass as part of persistent organic matter. Addressing this uncertainty has been hampered by the absence of quantitative assessments whether microbial matter makes up the majority of the persistent carbon in soil. Direct quantitation of microbial necromass in soil is very challenging because of an overlapping molecular signature with nonmicrobial organic carbon. Here, we use a comprehensive analysis of existing biomarker amino sugar data published between 1996 and 2018, combined with novel appropriation using an ecological systems approach, elemental carbon–nitrogen stoichiometry, and biomarker scaling, to demonstrate a suit of strategies for quantitating the contribution of microbe‐derived carbon to the topsoil organic carbon reservoir in global temperate agricultural, grassland, and forest ecosystems. We show that microbial necromass can make up more than half of soil organic carbon. Hence, we suggest that next‐generation field management requires promoting microbial biomass formation and necromass preservation to maintain healthy soils, ecosystems, and climate. Our analyses have important implications for improving current climate and carbon models, and helping develop management practices and policies.

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Warming increases microbial residue contribution to soil organic carbon in an alpine meadow

Cited by 121 publications

References 58 publications

Elevated temperature increases the accumulation of microbial necromass nitrogen in soil via increasing microbial turnover

Elevated temperature increases the accumulation of microbial necromass nitrogen in soil via increasing microbial turnover

Climate Change Dominated Long‐Term Soil Carbon Losses of Inner Mongolian Grasslands

Quantitative assessment of microbial necromass contribution to soil organic matter

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