Moss-dominated biocrust-based biodiversity enhances carbon sequestration via water interception and plant-soil-microbe interactions

Wei Wang; Meng-Ying Li; Rui Zhou; Fei Mo; Bao-Zhong Wang; Li Zhu; Hong-Yan Tao; Ying Zhu; Wen-Li Wang; Ze-Ying Zhao; You-Cai Xiong

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2022.105773

Moss-dominated biocrust-based biodiversity enhances carbon sequestration via water interception and plant-soil-microbe interactions

iScience. 2022 Dec 9;26(1):105773. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2022.105773. eCollection 2023 Jan 20.

Authors

Wei Wang¹, Meng-Ying Li¹, Rui Zhou², Fei Mo³, Bao-Zhong Wang¹, Li Zhu¹, Hong-Yan Tao¹, Ying Zhu⁴, Wen-Li Wang², Ze-Ying Zhao¹, You-Cai Xiong¹

Affiliations

¹ State Key Laboratory of Grassland Agro-Ecosystems, College of Ecology, Lanzhou University, Lanzhou 730000, China.
² School of Ecology and Environmental Science, Yunnan University, Kunming 650091, China.
³ College of Agronomy, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, Shaanxi 712100, China.
⁴ Institute of Biology, Gansu Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou 730000, China.

Abstract

We investigated a nature-based solution (NbS) via incorporating biocrust into alfalfa-maize intercropping system to test carbon sequestration in seriously eroded agricultural soils. Field investigation showed that the NbS (moss-dominated biocrust + intercropping) massively lowered surface soil erosion by 94.5% and soil carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) loss by 94.7 and 96.8% respectively, while promoting rainwater interception by 82.2% relative to bare land (CK). There generally existed positive interactions between biocrust and cropping in the integrated standing biodiversity system. Enhanced plant biomass input into soils substantially promoted soil fungal community diversity and abundance under NbS (p < 0.05). This enabled NbS to evidently improve soil macroaggregate proportion and mean weight diameter. Critically, topsoil carbon storage was increased by 2.5 and 10.7%, compared with CK and pure intercropping (p < 0.05). Conclusively, the standing diversity under such NbS fostered soil C sequestration via water interception and plant-soil-microbe interactions in degraded agricultural soils.

Keywords: Agricultural science; Biogeoscience; Soil science.