OPENAIRE OpenAire Sygma Bielefeld Academic Search Engine (BASE) HAL UPEC HAL-IRD MPG.PuRe Crossref Microsoft Academic Graph u:cris HAL INRAE eScholarship - University of California HAL Sorbonne Université UnpayWall HAL Descartes European Union Open Data Portal http://www.nature.com/articles/s41561-020-0612-3.pdf https://escholarship.org/content/qt84n3398c/qt84n3398c.pdf https://doi.org/21.11116/0000-0006-C73B-8 Nature Geoscience Open Access 2020-07-27 2020-11-20 Soil organic carbon management has the potential to aid climate change mitigation through drawdown of atmospheric carbon dioxide. To be effective, such management must account for processes influencing carbon storage and re-emission at different space and time scales. Achieving this requires a conceptual advance in our understanding to link carbon dynamics from the scales at which processes occur to the scales at which decisions are made. Here, we propose that soil carbon persistence can be understood through the lens of decomposers as a result of functional complexity derived from the interplay between spatial and temporal variation of molecular diversity and composition. For example, co-location alone can determine whether a molecule is decomposed, with rapid changes in moisture leading to transport of organic matter and constraining the fitness of the microbial community, while greater molecular diversity may increase the metabolic demand of, and thus potentially limit, decomposition. This conceptual shift accounts for emergent behaviour of the microbial community and would enable soil carbon changes to be predicted without invoking recalcitrant carbon forms that have not been observed experimentally. Functional complexity as a driver of soil carbon persistence suggests soil management should be based on constant care rather than one-time action to lock away carbon in soils. [SDE] Environmental Sciences DECOMPOSITION 2. Zero hunger 106022 Mikrobiologie [SDE.MCG]Environmental Sciences/Global Changes UNCERTAINTY 04 agricultural and veterinary sciences INPUTS 15. Life on land TRANSPORT MODEL [SDE.MCG] Environmental Sciences/Global Changes 106026 Ökosystemforschung 13. Climate action SDG 13 – Maßnahmen zum Klimaschutz [SDE]Environmental Sciences SDG 13 - Climate Action Meteorology & Atmospheric Sciences 106022 Microbiology GROWTH 0401 agriculture, forestry, and fisheries TURNOVER PLANT 106026 Ecosystem research MATTER Johannes Lehmann, Colleen M. Hansel, Christina Kaiser, Markus Kleber, Kate Maher, Stefano Manzoni, Naoise Nunan, Markus Reichstein, Joshua P. Schimel, Margaret S. Torn, William R. Wieder, Ingrid Kögel-Knabner, 2020-07-27 journalpaper Soil organic carbon management has the potential to aid climate change mitigation through drawdown of atmospheric carbon dioxide. To be effective, such management must account for processes influencing carbon storage and re-emission at different space and time scales. Achieving this requires a conceptual advance in our understanding to link carbon dynamics from the scales at which processes occur to the scales at which decisions are made. Here, we propose that soil carbon persistence can be understood through the lens of decomposers as a result of functional complexity derived from the interplay between spatial and temporal variation of molecular diversity and composition. For example, co-location alone can determine whether a molecule is decomposed, with rapid changes in moisture leading to transport of organic matter and constraining the fitness of the microbial community, while greater molecular diversity may increase the metabolic demand of, and thus potentially limit, decomposition. This conceptual shift accounts for emergent behaviour of the microbial community and would enable soil carbon changes to be predicted without invoking recalcitrant carbon forms that have not been observed experimentally. Functional complexity as a driver of soil carbon persistence suggests soil management should be based on constant care rather than one-time action to lock away carbon in soils. Persistence of soil organic carbon caused by functional complexity 21.11116/0000-0006-C73B-8 819446