Probst, Jean-Luc and Ouin, Annie
and Probst, Anne
and Delire, Christine
Early stage litter decomposition across biomes.
(2018)
Science of the Total Environment, 628-629. 1369-1394. ISSN 0048-9697
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(Document in English)
PDF (Author's version) - Requires a PDF viewer such as GSview, Xpdf or Adobe Acrobat Reader 1MB |
Official URL: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2018.01.012
Abstract
Through litter decomposition enormous amounts of carbon is emitted to the atmosphere. Numerous large-scale decomposition experiments have been conducted focusing on this fundamental soil process in order to under-stand the controls on the terrestrial carbon transfer to the atmosphere. However, previous studies were mostly based on site-specific litter and methodologies, adding major uncertainty to syntheses, comparisons and meta-analyses across different experiments and sites. In the TeaComposition initiative, the potential litter decomposition is investigated by using standardized substrates (Rooibos and Green tea) for comparison of litter mass loss at336 sites (ranging from −9 to +26 °C MAT and from 60 to 3113 mm MAP) across different ecosystems. In this study we tested the effect of climate (temperature and moisture), litter type and land-use on early stage decomposition (3 months) across nine biomes. We show that litter quality was the predominant controlling factor in early stage litter decomposition, which explained about 65% of the variability in litter decomposition at a global scale. The effect of climate, on the other hand, was not litter specific and explained <0.5% of the variation for Green tea and 5% for Rooibos tea, and was of significance only under unfavorable decomposition conditions i.e. xeric versus mesic environments). When the data were aggregated at the biome scale, climate played a significant role on decomposition of both litter types (explaining 64% of the variation for Green tea and 72% for Rooibos tea). No significant effect of land-use on early stage litter decomposition was noted within the temperate biome. Our results indicate that multiple drivers are affecting early stage litter mass loss with litter quality being dominant. In order to be able to quantify the relative importance of the different drivers over time, long-term studies combined with experimental trials are needed.
Item Type: | Article |
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Additional Information: | Thanks to Elsevier editor. The original PDF of the article can be found at https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969718300123 |
HAL Id: | hal-01827624 |
Audience (journal): | International peer-reviewed journal |
Uncontrolled Keywords: | |
Institution: | French research institutions > Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - CNRS (FRANCE) Université de Toulouse > Institut National Polytechnique de Toulouse - Toulouse INP (FRANCE) French research institutions > Institut National de la Recherche Agronomique - INRA (FRANCE) Université de Toulouse > Université Toulouse III - Paul Sabatier - UT3 (FRANCE) Other partners > Météo France (FRANCE) |
Laboratory name: | |
Funders: | CNRS-INEE |
Statistics: | download |
Deposited On: | 16 Mar 2018 14:39 |
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