Chapter 1 - Introduction and overview

Abstract

This chapter provides an introduction and brief history of research on soil respiration. Soil respiration is a crucial piece of the puzzle that is the earth's system. To understand how the earth's system functions, the role of soil respiration in regulating atmospheric CO2 concentration and climate dynamics have to be understood. As climate change is one of the main challenges facing humanity, quantification of soil respiration is no longer just a tedious academic issue. It is also relevant to farmers, foresters, and government officials. To effectively manipulate respiratory carbon emission from terrestrial ecosystems, the major factors that control soil respiration have to be identified. Because of the recent societal need to mitigate climate change and the scientific aspiration to understand soil respiration itself, the research community has been very active in studying soil respiration. Soil respiration is sometimes called the belowground respiration, in contrast with the aboveground respiration. The latter refers to respiratory CO2 production by the plant parts above the soil surface. Measurements are often made at the soil surface to quantify a rate of CO2 efflux from the soil to the atmosphere. The instantaneous rate of soil CO2 efflux is controlled not only by the rate of soil respiration but also by the transport of CO2 along the soil profile and at the soil surface.