title: Factors controlling soil organic carbon stability along a temperate forest altitudinal gradient.
abstract: Changes in soil organic carbon (SOC) stability may alter carbon release from the soil and, consequently, atmospheric CO2 concentration. The mean annual temperature (MAT) can change the soil physico-chemical characteristics and alter the quality and quantity of litter input into the soil that regulate SOC stability. However, the relationship between climate and SOC stability remains unclear. A 500-day incubation experiment was carried out on soils from an 11 °C-gradient mountainous system on Changbai Mountain in northeast China. Soil respiration during the incubation fitted well to a three-pool (labile, intermediate and stable) SOC decomposition model. A correlation analysis revealed that the MAT only influenced the labile carbon pool size and not the SOC stability. The intermediate carbon pool contributed dominantly to cumulative carbon release. The size of the intermediate pool was strongly related to the percentage of sand particle. The decomposition rate of the intermediate pool was negatively related to soil nitrogen availability. Because both soil texture and nitrogen availability are temperature independent, the stability of SOC was not associated with the MAT, but was heavily influenced by the intrinsic processes of SOC formation and the nutrient status.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Forest and Soil Ecology, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China.|Key Laboratory of Aquatic Botany and Watershed Ecology, Wuhan Botanical Garden, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan 430074, China.
authors.forename: Qiuxiang
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Tian
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Forest and Soil Ecology, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China.
authors.forename: Hongbo
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: He
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Forest and Soil Ecology, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China.|Environmental Studies Department, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA, USA.
authors.forename: Weixin
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Cheng
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Forest and Soil Ecology, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China.
authors.forename: Zhen
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Bai
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Forest and Soil Ecology, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China.|University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China.
authors.forename: Yang
authors.initials: Y
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Forest and Soil Ecology, Institute of Applied Ecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenyang 110016, China.|National Field Observation and Research Station of Shenyang Agro-Ecosystems, Shenyang 110016, China.
authors.forename: Xudong
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Zhang
mesh_terms: D000531:Altitude; D002244:Carbon / Q000737:chemistry*; D002681:China; D017753:Ecosystem; D065928:Forests; D012987:Soil / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D012987:Soil; D002244:Carbon