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Mineral control of organic carbon mineralization in a range of temperate conifer forest soils
Author(s) -
RASMUSSEN CRAIG,
SOUTHARD RANDAL J.,
HORWATH WILLIAM R.
Publication year - 2006
Publication title -
global change biology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 4.146
H-Index - 255
eISSN - 1365-2486
pISSN - 1354-1013
DOI - 10.1111/j.1365-2486.2006.01132.x
Subject(s) - mineralization (soil science) , soil water , humus , temperate forest , biome , temperate climate , soil carbon , environmental science , temperate rainforest , environmental chemistry , soil science , ecosystem , agronomy , chemistry , ecology , biology
Coupled climate–ecosystem models predict significant alteration of temperate forest biome distribution in response to climate warming. Temperate forest biomes contain approximately 10% of global soil carbon (C) stocks and therefore any change in their distribution may have significant impacts on terrestrial C budgets. Using the Sierra Nevada as a model system for temperate forest soils, we examined the effects of temperature and soil mineralogy on soil C mineralization. We incubated soils from three conifer biomes dominated by ponderosa pine (PP), white fir (WF), and red fir (RF) tree species, on granite (GR), basalt (BS), and andesite (AN) parent materials, at three temperatures (12.5°C, 7.5°C, 5.0°C). AN soils were dominated by noncrystalline materials (allophane, Al‐humus complexes), GR soils by crystalline minerals (kaolinite, vermiculite), and BS soils by a mix of crystalline and noncrystalline materials. Soil C mineralization (ranging from 1.9 to 34.6 [mg C (g soil C) −1 ] or 0.1 to 2.3 [mg C (g soil) −1 ]) differed significantly between parent materials in all biomes with a general pattern of AN