Journal
NATURE COMMUNICATIONS
Volume 11, Issue 1, Pages -Publisher
NATURE PORTFOLIO
DOI: 10.1038/s41467-020-17790-5
Keywords
-
Categories
Funding
- United States National Science Foundation [OPP-1504538, OPP-1503939]
- National Science Foundation Research Experience for Undergraduates Award [DBI-1852245]
Ask authors/readers for more resources
Soil microbial communities remain active during much of the Arctic winter, despite deeply frozen soils. Overwinter microbial activity affects the global carbon (C) budget, nutrient cycling, and vegetation composition. Microbial respiration is highly temperature sensitive in frozen soils, as liquid water and solute availability decrease rapidly with declining temperature. Climate warming and changes in snowpack are leading to warmer Arctic winter soils. Warmer winter soils are thought to yield greater microbial respiration of available C, greater overwinter CO2 efflux and greater nutrient availability to plants at thaw. Using field and laboratory observations and experiments, we demonstrate that persistently warm winter soils can lead to labile C starvation and reduced microbial respiration, despite the high C content of most Arctic soils. If winter soils continue to warm, microbial C limitation will reduce expected CO2 emissions and alter soil nutrient cycling, if not countered by greater labile C inputs. Soil microbial communities remain active throughout much of the Arctic winter, and Arctic winters are warming dramatically. Here, the authors show that persistently warm winter soils can lead to labile carbon starvation and reduced microbial respiration, despite the high carbon content of most Arctic soils.
Authors
I am an author on this paper
Click your name to claim this paper and add it to your profile.
Reviews
Recommended
No Data Available