title: Carbon and nitrogen dynamics during forest stand development: a global synthesis.
abstract: Our knowledge of carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) dynamics during stand development is not only essential for evaluating the role of secondary forests in the global terrestrial C cycle, but also crucial for understanding long-term C-N interactions in terrestrial ecosystems. However, a comprehensive understanding of forest C and N dynamics over age sequence remains elusive due to the diverse results obtained across individual studies. Here, we synthesized the results of more than 100 studies to examine C and N dynamics during forest stand development. Our results showed that C accumulated in aboveground vegetation, litter and forest floor pools, while the mineral soil C pool did not exhibit significant changes in most studies. The rate of C changes declined with stand age and approached equilibrium during the later stage of stand development. The rate of N changes exhibited linear increases with that of C changes, indicating that N also accrued in various ecosystem components except mineral soil. These results demonstrate that substantial increases in C pools over age sequence are accompanied by N accretion in forest ecosystems. The concurrent C and N dynamics suggest that forest ecosystems may have an intrinsic ability to preclude progressive N limitation during stand development.
authors.affiliation: Department of Botany and Microbiology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019, USA.
authors.forename: Yuanhe
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Yang
authors.affiliation: Department of Botany and Microbiology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019, USA.
authors.forename: Yiqi
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Luo
authors.affiliation: Department of Biology, Boston University, Boston, MA 02215, USA.
authors.forename: Adrien C
authors.initials: AC
authors.lastname: Finzi
mesh_terms: D002244:Carbon / Q000737:chemistry*; D017753:Ecosystem; D008903:Minerals / Q000737:chemistry; D009584:Nitrogen / Q000737:chemistry*; D018515:Plant Leaves / Q000737:chemistry; D012987:Soil / Q000737:chemistry*; D013997:Time Factors; D014197:Trees / Q000737:chemistry*; D014934:Wood / Q000737:chemistry
chemical_list: D008903:Minerals; D012987:Soil; D002244:Carbon; D009584:Nitrogen