Unravelling the mechanisms of the soil “microbial carbon pump” – soil C sequestration under global change

Recent methodological advances have revealed that a large part of old, stabilised soil C is derived from dead microbial biomass. In this project, we aim to increase understanding of the mechanisms that affect the fate of this large stable pool of C under climate change. We combine novel stable isotope labelling and compound-specific 13C isotope measurements with experiments that manipulate temperature and nutrient availability along climatic gradients in Northern Europe, Peruvian Andes and the Kenyan highlands, to better understand which factors control stabilisation of microbial derived C.