Microbes key to sequestering carbon in soil

Date:
June 5, 2023
Source:
Cornell University
Summary:
Microbes are by far the most important factor in determining how
much carbon is stored in the soil, according to a new study with
implications for mitigating climate change and improving soil
health for agriculture and food production.


Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIN Email

==========================================================================
FULL STORY ========================================================================== Microbes are by far the most important factor in determining how much
carbon is stored in the soil, according to a new study with implications
for mitigating climate change and improving soil health for agriculture
and food production.

The research is the first to measure the relative importance of microbial processes in the soil carbon cycle. The study's authors found that
the role microbes play in storing carbon in the soil is at least four
times more important than any other process, including decomposition
of biomatter.

That's important information: Earth's soils hold three times more carbon
than the atmosphere, creating a vital carbon sink in the fight against
climate change.

The study, "Microbial Carbon Use Efficiency Promotes Global Soil Carbon Storage," published May 24 in Nature, describes a novel approach to
better understanding soil carbon dynamics by combining a microbial
computer model with data assimilation and machine learning, to analyze
big data related to the carbon cycle.

The method measured microbial carbon use efficiency, which tells how
much carbon was used by microbes for growth versus how much was used
for metabolism.

When used for growth, carbon becomes sequestered by microbes in cells
and ultimately in the soil, and when used for metabolism, carbon is
released as a side product in the air as carbon dioxide, where it acts
as a greenhouse gas.

Ultimately, growth of microbes is more important than metabolism in
determining how much carbon is stored in the soil.

"This work reveals that microbial carbon use efficiency is more important
than any other factor in determining soil carbon storage," said Yiqi
Luo, the Liberty Hyde Bailey Professor in the School of Integrative
Plant Science in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences, and the
paper's senior author.

The new insights point agricultural researchers toward studying
farm management practices that may influence microbial carbon use
efficiency to improve soil health, which also helps ensure greater food security. Future studies may investigate steps to increase overall soil
carbon sequestration by microbes.

Researchers may also study how different types of microbes and substrates
(such as those high in sugars) may influence soil carbon storage.

Soil carbon dynamics have been studied for the last two centuries, but
those studies were mainly concerned with how much carbon gets into the
soil from leaf litter and roots, and how much is lost to the air in the
form of CO2 when organic matter decomposes.

"But we are the first group that can evaluate the relative importance
of microbial processes versus other processes," Luo said.

In an example of cutting-edge digital agriculture, Luo and colleagues made
a breakthrough and developed a method to integrate big data into an earth system computer model by using data assimilation and machine learning.

The model revealed that overall carbon use efficiency of microbe colonies
was at least four times as important as any of the other components that
were evaluated, including decomposition and carbon inputs.

The new process-based model, machine learning approach, which made this
result possible for the first time, opens the possibility for applying
the method to analyze other types of big data sets.

Feng Tao, a researcher at Tsinghua University, Beijing, is the paper's
first author. Xiaomeng Huang, a professor at Tsinghua University, is
a corresponding author, along with Luo. Benjamin Houlton, the Ronald
P. Lynch Dean of CALS and professor in the departments of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and of Global Development; and Johannes Lehmann,
the Liberty Hyde Bailey Professor in the Soil and Crop Sciences Section
of the School of Integrative Plant Science in CALS, are both co-authors.

The study was funded by the National Science Foundation, the National
Key Research and Development Program of China and the National Natural
Science Foundation of China, among others.

* RELATED_TOPICS
o Plants_&_Animals
# Soil_Types # Organic # Nature # Fungus
o Earth_&_Climate
# Global_Warming # Forest # Air_Quality # Climate
* RELATED_TERMS
o Agronomy o Soil_life o Vegetation o Mulch o Organic_farming
o Soil_science o Agriculture o Climate_change_mitigation

========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by Cornell_University. Original written
by Krishna Ramanujan, courtesy of the Cornell Chronicle. Note: Content
may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Feng Tao, Yuanyuan Huang, Bruce A. Hungate, Stefano Manzoni,
Serita D.

Frey, Michael W. I. Schmidt, Markus Reichstein, Nuno Carvalhais,
Philippe Ciais, Lifen Jiang, Johannes Lehmann, Ying-Ping Wang,
Benjamin Z.

Houlton, Bernhard Ahrens, Umakant Mishra, Gustaf Hugelius, Toby D.

Hocking, Xingjie Lu, Zheng Shi, Kostiantyn Viatkin, Ronald Vargas,
Yusuf Yigini, Christian Omuto, Ashish A. Malik, Guillermo Peralta,
Rosa Cuevas- Corona, Luciano E. Di Paolo, Isabel Luotto, Cuijuan
Liao, Yi-Shuang Liang, Vinisa S. Saynes, Xiaomeng Huang, Yiqi
Luo. Microbial carbon use efficiency promotes global soil carbon
storage. Nature, 2023; DOI: 10.1038/s41586-023-06042-3 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2023/06/230605181258.htm

--- up 1 year, 14 weeks, 10 hours, 51 minutes
* Origin: -=> Castle Rock BBS <=- Now Husky HPT Powered! (1:317/3)