Investigating interactions between soil microbial communities and soil organic matter dynamics along climate and vegetation gradients
EMSL Project ID
60009
Abstract
Soils hold globally-important stocks of organic matter, with critical relevance for nutrient cycling and climate change. As the primary agents of decomposition, soil microbes play a key role in soil organic matter (SOM) turnover. However, the complexity of interactions among the physical, chemical and biological properties of soil challenges efforts to characterize the mechanisms that control SOM dynamics over space and time. Our proposed project will draw on National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON) soil samples from across the US, using EMSL and JGI facilities to better understand the mechanisms controlling SOM persistence within and across ecosystems, by linking SOM chemistry with soil metabolomics, metaproteomics and metagenomics. Soil samples and data from the NEON Biorepository will be complemented by existing data and samples from an ongoing SOM stabilization mechanism study using NEON soils. Using these diverse samples, we will characterize SOM composition and the microbial metabolite profile using FTICR, GC-MS, and solid- and liquid-state NMR, and we will characterize soil microbial genetic potential and proteins using untargeted metagenomics and metaproteomics. We will test for the relative importance of specific microbial traits associated with SOM persistence by determining the genes and proteins associated with the mechanisms of SOM persistence, as characterized within the NEON datasets and our ongoing study. We will link SOM composition with the microbial metabolite profile, determining how metabolite classes and target metabolites reflect chemical, physical, or biological controls on SOM, and how the strength of these controls is influenced by environmental stress. Together, our proposed analyses will apply the powerful analytical capabilities of EMSL and JGI to the extraordinary datasets and samples afforded by the NEON network, bolstered by the samples from the mechanistic experiments within our ongoing experiment, to probe emerging paradigms of SOM persistence. Our findings will support predictions of continental SOM stabilization under future global change, as well as improving our understanding of the fundamental mechanisms underpinning SOM dynamics.
Project Details
Project type
FICUS Research
Start Date
2021-10-01
End Date
2023-10-16
Status
Closed
Released Data Link
Team
Principal Investigator
Co-Investigator(s)