On the role of soil water retention characteristic on aerobic microbial respiration

Ghezzehei, Teamrat A.; Sulman, Benjamin; Arnold, Chelsea L.; Bogie, Nathaniel A.; Berhe, Asmeret Asefaw

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-16-1187-2019

Articles | Volume 16, issue 6

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-16-1187-2019

© Author(s) 2019. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-16-1187-2019

© Author(s) 2019. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 License.

Articles | Volume 16, issue 6

Research article

| Highlight paper

|

21 Mar 2019

Research article | Highlight paper |

| 21 Mar 2019

On the role of soil water retention characteristic on aerobic microbial respiration

Teamrat A. Ghezzehei, Benjamin Sulman, Chelsea L. Arnold, Nathaniel A. Bogie, and Asmeret Asefaw Berhe

Model code and software

On the role of soil water retention characteristic on aerobic microbial respiration T. A. Ghezzehei, B. Sulman, C. L. Arnold, N. A. Bogie, and A. A. Berhe. https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.7749332

Short summary

Soil water is a medium from which microbes acquire resources and within which they are able to move. Occupancy and availability of water and oxygen gas in soils are mutually exclusive. In addition, as soil dries the remaining water is held with an increasing degree of adhesive energy, which restricts microbes' ability to extract resources from water. We introduce a mathematical model that describes these interacting effects and organic matter decomposition.