Microbial respiration per unit microbial biomass depends on litter layer carbon-to-nitrogen ratio

Spohn, M.

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-12-817-2015

Articles | Volume 12, issue 3

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-12-817-2015

© Author(s) 2015. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-12-817-2015

© Author(s) 2015. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Articles | Volume 12, issue 3

Research article

|

10 Feb 2015

Research article |

| 10 Feb 2015

Microbial respiration per unit microbial biomass depends on litter layer carbon-to-nitrogen ratio

M. Spohn

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Final revised paper (published on 10 Feb 2015)
Preprint (discussion started on 24 Oct 2014)
Supplement to the preprint

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

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- Supplement

RC C6916: 'review', Anonymous Referee #2, 20 Nov 2014
- AC C7204: 'Answer to Referee #2', Marie Spohn, 08 Dec 2014
RC C7855: 'review', Anonymous Referee #1, 06 Jan 2015

Peer-review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

AR by Marie Spohn on behalf of the Authors (10 Jan 2015) Author's response Manuscript

ED: Publish as is (12 Jan 2015) by Trevor Keenan

AR by Marie Spohn on behalf of the Authors (12 Jan 2015)

Short summary

Soil microbial respiration is a central process in the terrestrial carbon (C) cycle. In this study, I tested the effect of the carbon-to-nitrogen (C:N) ratio of soil litter layers on microbial respiration in absolute terms and per unit microbial biomass C. For this purpose, a global dataset on microbial respiration per unit microbial biomass C – termed the metabolic quotient (qCO2) – was compiled form literature data. It was found that the qCO2 in the soil litter layers was positively correlated