Abstract
To understand the differential effects of altitudinal gradient on soil inorganic nitrogen concentration and associated ammonia-oxidizingbacteria (AOB) and archaea (AOA), intact soil cores from a primary coniferous forest were in situ incubated in an alpine forest at a 3582-m altitude (A1) and transplanted to subalpine forests at a 3298-m altitude (A2) and 3023-m altitude (A3) on the eastern Tibetan Plateau. Transplant cooled the soil temperature of A2 but warmed the A3 soil temperature. Both AOA and AOB were found at the three altitudes. Compared to A1, A2 had greater AOA and AOB abundance, but A3 showed lower AOA abundance in organic soil. The AOA abundance was negatively correlated with ammonium concentration at all three altitudes, but AOB showed the reverse trend. Our results suggested that the soil nitrogen process responded differentially to soil core transplanting at different altitudes.
Highlights
Ongoing climate change, characterized by warming winters, snow cover decline and extreme weather events, is changing the processes of terrestrial ecosystems in cold biomes
This study was conducted at the Long-term Research Station of Alpine Forest Ecosystems in the Miyaluo Nature Reserve (102◦ 530 –102◦ 570 E, 31◦ 140 –31◦ 190 N, 2458–4619 m a.s.l.), which is located in Li County, western Sichuan, China (Figure 1)
The uptake and utilization of ammonium or nitrate by plants and microorganisms for growth and replication were included in assimilative processes [36]
Summary
Ongoing climate change, characterized by warming winters, snow cover decline and extreme weather events, is changing the processes of terrestrial ecosystems in cold biomes. Direct soil warming and snow removal experiments along latitudinal and altitudinal gradients have been widely used to understand the effects of climate warming on soil processes [1,2,3,4]. Direct soil warming experiments cannot fully reflect the impact of climate warming on soil processes in cold regions. In the alpine-gorge area, the duration and depth of seasonal snow cover, seasonal freeze-thaw cycles, and temperature vary along the altitudinal gradient within a small range [8], which provides an ideal platform for investigating the effects of warming, snow cover decline, and seasonal freeze-thaw cycles on soil processes.
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