Global change alters peatland carbon cycling through plant biomass allocation
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Global change alters peatland carbon cycling through plant biomass allocation Jing Tian & Brian A. Branfireun & Zoë Lindo
Received: 24 January 2020 / Accepted: 3 August 2020 # Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2020
Abstract Aims Global change is shown to significantly affect the C storage function of peatlands; however, a majority of previous research is focused on a single environmental stressor such as the increased temperature. As a result, little is known about the interactive effect of multiple environmental stressors on peatland C storage, especially in sedge-dominated fen peatlands. Methods We performed a full factorial experiment of increased temperature and elevated atmospheric CO2 concentration on minerotrophic, sedge-dominated fen monoliths to experimentally examine the individual and interactive effects of simulated future climate conditions on peatland plant biomass, CO2 exchange, and pore water dissolved organic carbon (DOC) over one full growing season. Results Our study demonstrates that warming and elevated atmospheric CO2 significantly increased aboveground and belowground biomass, respectively, as well as the gross ecosystem production (GEP), while the Responsible Editor: Luca Bragazza Electronic supplementary material The online version of this article (https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-020-04664-4) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users. J. Tian : B. A. Branfireun : Z. Lindo (*) Department of Biology, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario N6A 5B7, Canada e-mail: [email protected] B. A. Branfireun Centre for Environment and Sustainability, University of Western Ontario, London, Ontario N6A 5B7, Canada
DOC concentrations and respired CO2 from peatland soils only increased under warming Conclusions Our results suggest that global change will increase both plant production and microbial decomposition, but with altered plant biomass allocation between aboveground and belowground. Our study provides experimental evidence for shifts in ecosystem-level carbon dynamics under global change for a sedge-dominated peatland, and suggests that while carbon stores may weaken, the carbon sink will be maintained in these types of northern peatlands if hydrological conditions are largely maintained. Keywords Carbon cycling . Climate change . Ecosystem respiration . Elevated carbon dioxide . Global change . Net ecosystem exchange . Plant biomass . Sedge-dominated peatland . Warming
Introduction Despite their low productivities, northern peatlands are important carbon (C) storage systems due to low decomposition rates under cool climate and wet soil conditions (Gorham 1991). Although boreal peatlands only cover about 3% of the Earth’s land surface, they are estimated to store approximately 450 to 1000 Pg of C (Yu 2012; Nichols and Peteet 2019), which is a large proportion of all terrestrial soil C stocks (Gorham 1991). Maintaining C storage of northern peatlands is vital for moderating increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations and lessening furth
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