Diverse soil microbial communities may mitigate climate system bifurcation

Abstract

Permafrost thaw reinforces greenhouse gas production. The resulting growth of greenhouse gases (especially methane) in the atmosphere may trigger a climate system bifurcation. To study how changes in the microbial community may cause greenhouse gas emissions from permafrost and produce bifurcations in climate temperature dynamics we propose a conceptual nonlinear model that couples an atmospheric dynamics model with the population structure of microbial communities. Our model is mathematically well-posed, demonstrating that microbial population diversity can significantly lower planetary surface temperatures, an outcome contingent upon the average population parameters and their standard deviations.