{"id":3661,"date":"2021-10-13T12:09:06","date_gmt":"2021-10-13T12:09:06","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/the-jena-experiment.de\/?p=3661"},"modified":"2021-10-13T12:09:31","modified_gmt":"2021-10-13T12:09:31","slug":"new-publication-from-prommer-et-al-in-global-change-biology","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/the-jena-experiment.de\/index.php\/2021\/10\/13\/new-publication-from-prommer-et-al-in-global-change-biology\/","title":{"rendered":"New publication from Prommer et al. in Global Change Biology: Increased microbial growth, biomass, and turnover drive soil organic carbon accumulation at higher plant diversity"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><figure class=\"alignright size-large is-resized\"><img loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-177.png\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-3662\" width=\"313\" height=\"262\" srcset=\"\/wp-content\/uploads\/image-177.png 638w, \/wp-content\/uploads\/image-177-300x251.png 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 313px) 100vw, 313px\" \/><\/figure><\/div>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"justify\">Species\u2010rich plant communities have been shown to be more productive and  to exhibit increased long\u2010term soil organic carbon (SOC) storage. Soil  microorganisms are central to the conversion of plant organic matter  into SOC, yet the relationship between plant diversity, soil microbial  growth, turnover as well as carbon use efficiency (CUE) and SOC  accumulation is unknown. As heterotrophic soil microbes are primarily  carbon limited, it is important to understand how they respond to  increased plant\u2010derived carbon inputs at higher plant species richness  (PSR). <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"justify\">We used the long\u2010term grassland biodiversity experiment in Jena,  Germany, to examine how microbial physiology responds to changes in  plant diversity and how this affects SOC content. The Jena Experiment  considers different numbers of species (1\u201360), functional groups (1\u20134)  as well as functional identity (small herbs, tall herbs, grasses, and  legumes). <\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"justify\">We found that PSR accelerated microbial growth and turnover  and increased microbial biomass and necromass. PSR also accelerated  microbial respiration, but this effect was less strong than for  microbial growth. In contrast, PSR did not affect microbial CUE or  biomass\u2010specific respiration. Structural equation models revealed that  PSR had direct positive effects on root biomass, and thereby on  microbial growth and microbial biomass carbon. Finally, PSR increased  SOC content via its positive influence on microbial biomass carbon. We  suggest that PSR favors faster rates of microbial growth and turnover,  likely due to greater plant productivity, resulting in higher amounts of  microbial biomass and necromass that translate into the observed  increase in SOC. We thus identify the microbial mechanism linking  species\u2010rich plant communities to a carbon cycle process of importance  to Earth&#8217;s climate system. <\/p>\n\n\n\n<h4>Reference:<\/h4>\n\n\n\n<p>Prommer, J., Walker, T., Wanek, W., Braun, J., Zezula, D., Hu, Y.,  Hofhansl, F., &amp; Richter, A. (2020). Increased microbial growth,  biomass, and turnover drive soil organic carbon accumulation at higher  plant diversity. <em>Global change biology<\/em>, <em>26<\/em>(2), 669\u2013681. <a href=\"https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1111\/gcb.14777\">https:\/\/doi.org\/10.1111\/gcb.14777<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Species\u2010rich plant communities have been shown to be more productive and to exhibit increased long\u2010term soil organic carbon (SOC) storage. Soil microorganisms are central to the conversion of plant organic&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3662,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[15,13],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-jena-experiment.de\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3661"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-jena-experiment.de\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-jena-experiment.de\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-jena-experiment.de\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-jena-experiment.de\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3661"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/the-jena-experiment.de\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3661\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3664,"href":"https:\/\/the-jena-experiment.de\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3661\/revisions\/3664"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-jena-experiment.de\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3662"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/the-jena-experiment.de\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3661"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-jena-experiment.de\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3661"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/the-jena-experiment.de\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3661"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}