Photoassimilated carbon allocation in a wheat plant-soil system as affected by soil fertility and land-use history

• Published in: Plant and soil Vol. 383; no. 1-2; pp. 173 - 189
• Main Authors: Chowdhury, Saikat, Farrell, Mark, Bolan, Nanthi
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: Cham Springer-Verlag 01.10.2014; Springer; Springer International Publishing; Springer Nature B.V
• Subjects: Agricultural research; Agricultural soils; Agrology; Agronomy. Soil science and plant productions; Animal, plant and microbial ecology; arable soils; Biochemistry and biology; Biological and medical sciences; Biomedical and Life Sciences; Carbon; Carbon content; Carbon dioxide; Cereal crops; Chemical, physicochemical, biochemical and biological properties; Cropping systems; Ecology; Environmental aspects; Fertility; Flowers & plants; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; General agronomy. Plant production; History; Land use; Life Sciences; Microbiology; Nutrient status; nutrients; Physics, chemistry, biochemistry and biology of agricultural and forest soils; Plant Physiology; Plant roots; Plant Sciences; Plant-soil relationships; Plants; Radiocarbon; Regular Article; Roots; Shoots; Soil biochemistry; Soil fertility; Soil microorganisms; Soil nutrients; soil sampling; Soil science; Soil Science & Conservation; Soil-plant relationships. Soil fertility; Soil-plant relationships. Soil fertility. Fertilization. Amendments; Soils; Terrestrial ecosystems; Triticum aestivum; Wheat; C pulse labelling; Fertility; Carbon distribution; Land-use practice; Microbial biomass; Carbon sequestration; Monocotyledones; Soil fertility; Practice; Radioisotope; History; Triticum; Allocation; Gramineae; Angiospermae; C3-Type; Carbon 14; Influence factor; Vegetals; Radiolabelling; Nuclear method; Property of soil; Land use; Distribution; Spermatophyta; Soil plant relation; Physical method; Pulse labelling
• ISSN: 0032-079X; 1573-5036
• DOI: 10.1007/s11104-014-2173-y

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: Carbon (C) cycling in terrestrial ecosystems is influenced by the distribution of photo-assimilated C in the plant-soil system. Photo-assimilated C allocation in a wheat cropping system was examined to identify the links between soil fertility, C partitioning and soil C sequestration. METHODS: A pulse labelling experiment was conducted where¹⁴CO₂was introduced to wheat plants grown in two groups of soils of varying fertility: arable soils spiked with nutrients, and soils with differing land-use histories. Wheat shoot, root and soil samples were taken 1, 14 and 28 days after pulse labelling to examine the fluxes of¹⁴C in the plant-root-soil system. RESULTS: The partitioning of¹⁴C in wheat plant-root-soil system was found to vary with time, nutrient spiked soil fertility and land-use history. At the end of the experiment using spiked soils, a positive correlation was observed between the allocation of¹⁴C in the shoots and soil fertility, whereas in the roots, this relationship was negative. The overall allocation of¹⁴C in the plant-root system differed significantly between the land-use histories; while in the spiked arable soils¹⁴C allocation in the shoots and roots systematically followed their fertility status. CONCLUSIONS: There was a weak relationship between C allocation and soil fertility in the soils of different land-use history compared to the strong relationship in the spiked arable soils. This suggests that other factors in the soils under different land uses were more important than nutrient status alone in driving photo-assimilated C allocation. This study demonstrated that soil fertility and land-use history have a crucial role in the allocation of photo-assimilated C in the plant-soil system and are important factors by which C sequestration in soil may be impacted.