Abstract
Studies on the importance of root biomass and the effects that changes in vegetation coverage cause on carbon amount and stock are scarce, especially in the cerrado biome. Taking into account the scarcity of information about root biomass estimates, this work aimed to quantify root biomass under different land uses and native cerrado in Tocantins, Brazil. The research was conducted in different land uses: agriculture, pasture, eucalyptus and control with native cerrado forest. Six trenches with dimensions of 70 x 70 cm were opened and root biomass was collected at depths of 0-10, 10-20, 20-30, 30-40 and 40-50 cm. With the aid of a sieve, root biomass was collected and separated into fine and coarse roots. The amounts of fine and coarse root biomass showed the highest mean values of 7.7 and 12.9 g, respectively, in the eucalyptus area. Root biomass stocks were higher in the eucalyptus area, with maximum values above 3.68 Mg ha-1. Root biomass amounts and stocks were greater in eucalyptus areas, since forest areas, whether planted or native, manage to keep the environment in balance due to their long-term cycles, greater stability and low degree of disturbance.
Highlights
Plants have the ability to produce their own food through the photosynthesis process, and as a result, it generates biomass (Vinhal-Freitas et al, 2017)
Human activities have caused an increase in the concentration of greenhouse gases (GHG) in the atmosphere, mainly due to interference in land use, which influences the capacity of soils to store CO2 present in plant biomass
In areas where land use changes were observed, in area of Eucalyptus sp., the highest values may be linked to greater conservation of organic material, since the forest area has greater soil and root biomass protection from degrading agents when compared to areas without vegetation coverage, or in state of degradation (Nascimento et al, 2019)
Summary
Plants have the ability to produce their own food through the photosynthesis process, and as a result, it generates biomass (Vinhal-Freitas et al, 2017). This process assimilates CO2 from the atmosphere and stores carbon in the biomass, and with that, studies on biomass production and storage of greenhouse gases, carbon dioxide, have been developed (Soleimani et al, 2019). Human activities have caused an increase in the concentration of greenhouse gases (GHG) in the atmosphere, mainly due to interference in land use, which influences the capacity of soils to store CO2 present in plant biomass (Le. Quéré et al, 2018; Santana et al, 2020). Non-anthropized forest coverages provide greater carbon stocks in the soil due to the high deposition of nutrients, organic matter, since management, disturbance intensity, land use changes and successional stages are factors that influence biomass volume and carbon reserves that are deposited in the soil over time (Primieri et al, 2017).
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