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Urbanization drives convergence in soil profile texture and carbon content.

ABSTRACT: Urban development has driven extensive modification of the global landscape. This shift in land use and land cover alters ecological functioning, and thereby affects sustainable management agendas. Urbanization fundamentally reshapes the soils that underlay landscapes, and throughout the soil profile, extends impacts of urbanization far below the landscape surface. The impacts of urbanization on deeper soils that are beyond the reach of regular land management are largely unknown, and validation of general theories of convergent ecosystem properties are thwarted by a dearth of both level of measurement effort and the substantial heterogeneity in soils and urban landscapes. Here, we examined two soil properties with strong links to ecological functioning-carbon and mineral-fraction particle size-measured in urban soils, and compared them to their pre-urbanization conditions across a continental gradient encompassing global soil diversity. We hypothesized that urbanization drove convergence of soils properties from heterogeneous pre-urban conditions towards homogeneous urban conditions. Based on our observations, we confirm the hypothesis. Both soil carbon and particle size converged toward an intermediate value in the full data distribution, from pre-urban to urban conditions. These outcomes in urban soils were observed to uniformly be fine textured soils with overall lower carbon content. Although these properties are desirable for supporting urban infrastructure (e.g. buildings, pipes), they constrain the potential to render ecosystem services. Since soil profile texture and carbon content were convergent and observed across 11 cities, we suggest that these property profiles can be used as a universal urban soil profile to: 1) provide a clear prediction for how urbanization will shift soil properties from pre-urban conditions, 2) facilitate the adoption of commonly-accepted soil profiles for process models, and 3) offer a reference point to test against urban management strategies and how they impact soil resources.

SUBMITTER: Herrmann DL

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7898117 | biostudies-literature |

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Project description:Forest soil carbon (C) sequestration has an important effect on global C dynamics and is regulated by various environmental factors. Mixed and pure plantations are common afforestation choices in north China, but how forest type and environmental factors interact to affect soil C stock remains unclear. We hypothesize that forest type changes soil physicochemical properties and surface biological factors, and further contributes to soil active C components, which together affect soil C sequestration capacity and C dynamic processes. Three 46-year-old 25 m × 25 m pure Pinus tabulaeformis forests (PF) and three 47-year-old 25 m × 25 m mixed coniferous-broadleaf (Pinus tabulaeformis-Quercus liaotungensis) forests (MF) were selected as the two treatments and sampled in August 2016. In 2017, soil temperature (ST) at 10 cm were measured every 30 min for the entire vegetation season. Across 0-50 cm (five soil layers, 10 cm per layer), we also measured C components and environmental factors which may affect soil C sequestration, including soil organic carbon (SOC), soil total nitrogen (STN), dissolved organic carbon (DOC), microbial biomass carbon (MBC), soil moisture (SM) and soil pH. We then incubated samples for 56 days at 25 °C to monitor the C loss through CO2 release, characterized as cumulative mineralization carbon (CMC) and mineralized carbon (MC). Our results indicate that ST, pH, SM and litter thickness were affected by forest type. Average SOC stock in MF was 20% higher than in PF (MF: 11.29 kg m-2; PF: 13.52 kg m-2). Higher CMC under PF caused more soil C lost, and CMC increased 14.5% in PF (4.67 g kg-1 soil) compared to MF (4.04 g kg-1 soil) plots over the two-month incubation period. SOC stock was significantly positively correlated with SM (p < 0.001, R2 = 0.43), DOC (p < 0.001, R2 = 0.47) and CMC (p < 0.001, R2 = 0.33), and significantly negatively correlated with pH (p < 0.001, R2 = -0.37) and MC (p < 0.001, R2 = -0.32). SOC stock and litter thickness may have contributed to more DOC leaching in MF, which may also provide more C source for microbial decomposition. Conversely, lower SM and pH in MF may inhibit microbial activity, which ultimately makes higher MC and lower CMC under MF and promotes C accumulation. Soil mineralized C drives more C stock in coniferous-broadleaf mixed plantations compared to pure plantations, and CMC and MC should be considered when soil C balance is assessed.

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Urbanization drives convergence in soil profile texture and carbon content.

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