Document Type

Article

Publication Date

7-1-2025

Publication Title

Nature Communications

Disciplines

Biology

Abstract

Plant diversity can alter soil carbon stocks, but the effects are difficult to predict due to the multitude of mechanisms involved. We propose that these mechanisms and their outcomes can be better understood by testing how plant diversity affects particulate organic matter (POM) and mineral-associated organic matter (MAOM) depending on whether MAOM storage is "saturated" and the total soil organic matter pool is limited by plant inputs. Such context-dependency of plant-diversity effects on POM, MAOM, and total soil organic matter helps explain inconsistencies in plant-diversity-soil-carbon relationships across studies. Further illumination of this context-dependency is required to better predict consequences of biodiversity losses and gains, and manage ecosystems as carbon sinks and nutrient stores.

Comments

We gratefully acknowledge the support of iDiv, which is funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG-FZT 118, 202548816), as well as the Jena Experiment (FOR 5000). G.A. acknowledges support by the Czech Academy of Sciences (LQ200962401 Soil fauna-the neglected driver of soil carbon formation and stability, to G.A.), N.E. acknowledges support by the DFG (Ei 862/29-1; Ei 862/31-1), and M.L. is funded by the Zwillenberg-Tietz Foundation (2023-03) and acknowledges support by the DFG (La 4685/1). K.E.M. was supported as a Mercator Fellow via DFG grant FOR 5000

DOI

10.1038/s41467-025-60712-6

Version

Publisher's PDF

Volume

16

Issue

1

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