Soil microbial organic nitrogen uptake is regulated by carbon availability

Mark Farrell; Miranda Prendergast-Miller; Davey L. Jones; Paul W. Hill; Leo M. Condron

doi:10.1016/j.soilbio.2014.07.003

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Soil microbial organic nitrogen uptake is regulated by carbon availability

Journal article

Open access

Peer reviewed

Soil microbial organic nitrogen uptake is regulated by carbon availability

Mark Farrell, Miranda Prendergast-Miller, Davey L. Jones, Paul W. Hill and Leo M. Condron

Soil biology & biochemistry, Vol.77, pp.261-267

2014

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.soilbio.2014.07.003

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Abstract

14C

Dissolved organic nitrogen

Grassland soil

Nutrient limitation

Peptide

Rapid uptake

Plants and microorganisms intensely compete for nitrogen (N) at many stages of the terrestrial N cycle. In particular, the dissolved organic N (DON) pool, and competition for low molecular weight dissolved organic N (LMWDON) compounds such as amino acids and peptides (and LMW dissolved organic matter; LMWDOM as a whole) has received significant recent research interest. However, as LMWDON compounds contain both N and carbon (C), a question that remains is whether soil microorganisms are primarily taking up LMWDON mainly for the C or the N contained therein. We investigated microbial uptake rates of the model peptide l-trialanine as a rapidly cycling LMWDON compound in temperate grassland soils of differing fertility using 14C labelling to assess how soil fertility status influenced microbial uptake of LMWDON. We then imposed an excess of C as glucose and/or N as NH4Cl to ask whether the uptake of the peptide was affected by C or N excess. Our results demonstrate that l-trialanine is taken up rapidly from the soil solution (t½ < 1.5 min), and that an excess of C, rather than N, resulted in a reduced uptake of the peptide. From this, we conclude that LMWDON is taken up primarily to fulfil the C requirement of soil microorganisms, indicating that they exist in a C-limited state, and are able to respond quickly to a transient influx of an easily metabolisable resource.

Details

Title: Soil microbial organic nitrogen uptake is regulated by carbon availability
Authors/Creators: Mark Farrell - Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation
Miranda Prendergast-Miller - Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation
Davey L. Jones - Bangor University
Paul W. Hill - Bangor University
Leo M. Condron - Lincoln University
Publication Details: Soil biology & biochemistry, Vol.77, pp.261-267
Publisher: Elsevier Ltd
Identifiers: 991005560322107891
Copyright: © 2014 The Authors.
Murdoch Affiliation: Centre for Sustainable Farming Systems
Language: English
Resource Type: Journal article

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Collaboration types: Domestic collaboration; International collaboration
Citation topics: 3 Agriculture, Environment & Ecology; 3.45 Soil Science; 3.45.112 Soil Carbon Dynamics
Web Of Science research areas: Soil Science
ESI research areas: Agricultural Sciences