Plant diversity positively affects short‐term soil carbon storage in experimental grasslands
Abstract
Increasing atmospheric CO 2 concentration and related climate change have stimulated much interest in the potential of soils to sequester carbon. In ‘The Jena Experiment’, a managed grassland experiment on a former agricultural field, we investigated the link between plant diversity and soil carbon storage. The biodiversity gradient ranged from one to 60 species belonging to four functional groups. Stratified soil samples were taken to 30 cm depth from 86 plots in 2002, 2004 and 2006, and organic carbon contents were determined. Soil organic carbon stocks in 0–30 cm decreased from 7.3 kg C m −2 in 2002 to 6.9 kg C m −2 in 2004, but had recovered to 7.8 kg C m −2 by 2006. During the first 2 years, carbon storage was limited to the top 5 cm of soil while below 10 cm depth, carbon was lost probably as short‐term effect of the land use change. After 4 years, carbon stocks significantly increased within the top 20 cm. More importantly, carbon storage significantly increased with sown species richness (log‐transformed) in all depth segments and even carbon losses were significantly smaller with higher species richness. Although increasing species diversity increased root biomass production, statistical analyses revealed that species diversity per se was more important than biomass production for changes in soil carbon. Below 20 cm depth, the presence of one functional group, tall herbs, significantly reduced carbon losses in the beginning of the experiment. Our analysis indicates that plant species richness and certain plant functional traits accelerate the build‐up of new carbon pools within 4 years. Additionally, higher plant diversity mitigated soil carbon losses in deeper horizons. This suggests that higher biodiversity might lead to higher soil carbon sequestration in the long‐term and therefore the conservation of biodiversity might play a role in greenhouse gas mitigation.
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The plant diversity effect may be strongest in the topsoil and decrease with soil depth.
“Despite the consistency of the plant diversity effect, it may be strongest in the topsoil and decrease with soil depth 25,39 , which may be due to the fact that root carbon inputs 24,39 and microbial activity 41 decrease with soil depth.”
From Plant diversity increases soil microbial activity and soil carbon storage (2015) · cites this paper as [25]
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- Authors
- STEINBEISS, S., BEßLER, H., ENGELS, C., TEMPERTON, V. M., BUCHMANN, N., ROSCHER, C., KREUTZIGER, Y., BAADE, J., HABEKOST, M., & GLEIXNER, G.
- Affiliations
- Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry (DE)
- Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin (DE)
- Forschungszentrum Jülich (DE)
- ETH Zurich (CH)
- Friedrich Schiller University Jena (DE)
- Corresponding author
- GLEIXNER, GERD
- Venue
- Global Change Biology
- Publisher
- Wiley
- Published
- 2008-11-18
- Volume
- 14
- Issue
- 12
- Pages
- 2937-2949
- ISSN
- 1354-1013 (ISSN-L)
- 1365-2486
- OpenAlex
- W2130121478
- Cited by
- 348
- References
- 50
- Citations by year
- 2026: 6 · 2025: 19 · 2024: 21 · 2023: 17 · 2022: 25 · 2021: 21 · 2020: 26 · 2019: 29 · 2018: 18 · 2017: 28 · 2016: 18 · 2015: 18 · 2014: 25 · 2013: 19 · 2012: 14
- FWCI
- 22.34
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Locations
- Global Change Biology (publishedVersion)
- Max Planck Institute for Plasma Physics (submittedVersion)
- JuSER (Forschungszentrum Jülich) (submittedVersion)
- MPG.PuRe (Max Planck Society) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Soil Science › Soil Carbon and Nitrogen Dynamics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Nature and Landscape Conservation › Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Soil Science › Soil erosion and sediment transport
- Keywords
- plant species richness, soil organic carbon, soil carbon sequestration, grassland biodiversity, plant functional groups, root biomass, carbon loss, soil depth, land use change, Jena Experiment, biodiversity conservation, greenhouse gas emissions reduction
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