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Tropical forest carbon sink hinges on 'odd couple'
http://www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=129069[font face=Serif]Press Release 13-157
[font size=5]Tropical forest carbon sink hinges on 'odd couple'[/font]
[font size=4]Unique housing arrangement between trees and bacteria[/font]
[font size=3]September 16, 2013
A unique housing arrangement between a specific tree species and carbo-loading bacteria may determine how well tropical forests can absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, says new research today in an advance online publication of the journal Nature.
The findings suggest that the role of tropical forests in offsetting the atmospheric buildup of carbon from fossil fuels depends on tree diversity, particularly in forests recovering from exploitation.
Tropical forests thrive on natural nitrogen fertilizer pumped into the soil by trees in the legume family, a diverse group of plants that includes beans and peas, the researchers report.
"Fast-growing nitrogen-fixing trees are not common outside of the tropics, but are found in surprisingly high diversity there," said Henry Gholz, program director in the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Division of Environmental Biology, which funded the research.
"These findings place the trees' ability to capture atmospheric nitrogen and to use it to stimulate growth in the context of long-term tropical forest development," Gholz said. "This process not only allows these trees to get out of the gate quickly after a disturbance, but to maintain dominance decades to centuries later."
The researchers studied recovering forests in Panama that had been exploited five to 300 years earlier.
The presence of legume trees ensured rapid forest growth, and thus a substantial carbon sink, in the first 12 years of recovery.
Tracts of land that were pasture only 12 years before had already accumulated as much as 40 percent of the carbon found in fully mature forests. Legumes contributed more than half the nitrogen needed to make that happen.
…[/font][/font]
http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature12525[font size=5]Tropical forest carbon sink hinges on 'odd couple'[/font]
[font size=4]Unique housing arrangement between trees and bacteria[/font]
[font size=3]September 16, 2013
A unique housing arrangement between a specific tree species and carbo-loading bacteria may determine how well tropical forests can absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, says new research today in an advance online publication of the journal Nature.
The findings suggest that the role of tropical forests in offsetting the atmospheric buildup of carbon from fossil fuels depends on tree diversity, particularly in forests recovering from exploitation.
Tropical forests thrive on natural nitrogen fertilizer pumped into the soil by trees in the legume family, a diverse group of plants that includes beans and peas, the researchers report.
"Fast-growing nitrogen-fixing trees are not common outside of the tropics, but are found in surprisingly high diversity there," said Henry Gholz, program director in the National Science Foundation's (NSF) Division of Environmental Biology, which funded the research.
"These findings place the trees' ability to capture atmospheric nitrogen and to use it to stimulate growth in the context of long-term tropical forest development," Gholz said. "This process not only allows these trees to get out of the gate quickly after a disturbance, but to maintain dominance decades to centuries later."
The researchers studied recovering forests in Panama that had been exploited five to 300 years earlier.
The presence of legume trees ensured rapid forest growth, and thus a substantial carbon sink, in the first 12 years of recovery.
Tracts of land that were pasture only 12 years before had already accumulated as much as 40 percent of the carbon found in fully mature forests. Legumes contributed more than half the nitrogen needed to make that happen.
…[/font][/font]
