Technical Terms

breakdown of rocks throug:

• water, rain, ice

• chemicals

• temperature shifts

• biota

Removal of rocks by:

• water, rain, ice

• wind

• gravity

• (biota)

reduction of exposed landforms

breaking up and destruction of chunks into smaller chunks

FE: Mountains in hot, dry desserts

decomposition of rocks by surface processes that change the chemical composition of the original material

FE: warm, damp climates

• exfoliation

• abrasion

• frost-wedging

• thermal expansion

• salt-wedging

increases rock surface

• Oxidation

• Hydrolysis

• hydration

• Reduction/mineral dissolution

• acidification/carbonation

Physical mechanical:

• Applied pressure

• Crack widening

• Rock exposure

• Removal of grains

Chemical:

• Providing water for chemical reaction

• Altering the atmospheric environment

• Excretion of reactive substances

• Oxidation reactions

• borrowing

• bore

• urine/excrement/mucus

• growth in joints/cracks

• excretion of (in)organic compounds

• excrete acids and chelators

carbon trapping (MgCO3, FeCO3…)

Als Anabolismus bezeichnet man die Reaktionen des Stoffwechsels, die dem Aufbau von chemischen Verbindungen dienen; im Zuge der anabolen Reaktionen werden über die Nahrung aufgenommene Fremdstoffe abgebaut und ihre Bestandteile zum Aufbau körpereigener Substanzen benutzt.

Catabolism (/kəˈtæbəlɪzəm/) is the set of metabolic pathways that breaks down molecules into smaller units that are either oxidized to release energy or used in other anabolic reactions

Slime mold or slime mould is an informal name given to a polyphyletic assemblage of unrelated eukaryotic organisms in the Stramenopiles, Rhizaria, Discoba, Amoebozoa and Holomycota clades. Most are microscopic; those in the Myxogastria form larger plasmodial slime molds visible to the naked eye.

• protecting the cell from osmotic and mechanical stress

• gives rigidity / defines the cellular structure

• high plasticity and permeable

• mediates relationships with environment (adhesins and receptors)

Animalia and protozoa do not have cell walls

• wide variety of cell wall types

• adapted to hostile environment

• Some archaea lack a cell wall

• surface layer

• Found in most archeae

  • part of cell wall

  • Achored to cell membrane

  • made of protein / glycoprotein

lattice structure similar to S layer

Das Pseudopeptidoglycan oder Pseudomurein ist eine Substanz, die bei Archaeen als Zellwand auftritt. Es handelt sich um ein Polysaccharid, an das kurze Aminosäureketten gebunden sind.

• Most glycoproteins (associated with polysaccharides)

• maintenance of shape

• adhesion processes

• absorption of molecules

• signal transmission…

• most important structural component

• Provide rigidity

• Link proteins and chitin

• polymers in the extracellular space

• Structure and anchor

• All eukaryotes

• Most prokaryotes

• Archeae

• Some anaerobic bacteria

Energy gain through light

Energy gain through chemicals

Inorganic C source

Organic C gain

An organism that lives in nutrient-rich environments (especially carbon)

• Nutrient rich environments with fluctuations

• Heavily fertilized soils

• Bacteria

• r strategists

An organism that live in nutrient poor environments

• Nutrient poor environments

• Access recalcitrant SOM

• Fungi

• K strategists

• Sparse vegetation is unable to protect surface from erosion

• Even though less rainfall, it is easier to erode the hill slopes

• Only small river valleys form

• Dense network of rivers form

• Eroded material accumulates in valleys

• Vegetation intercepts rainfall

• Limits rainfall‘s ability to erode Earth‘s surface

• Vegetation protects slopes from erosion

• Vegetation concentrates water runoff and eroded material in valleys

• Large, deep river valleys

• Eroded material is transported in valleys

• deep weathering

• thick soils

• shallow weathering

• thinner soils

• oxidation of minerals (banded iron formation)

• oxidization of CH4 (slowed global warming)

  • ice ages

• formation of ozone layer

• carbon cycling: organic matter oxidation and bury

• ozone layer-> UV protection

• mass extinction of obligate anaerobes

• more complex metabolisms

• biodiversification

• more energy gain from respiration

• evolution of larger life-forms

• regulation of earths climate through CO2 sequestration in sea

Rhizosphere priming is the change in soil organic matter (SOM) decomposition caused by plant root activity that is often associated with rhizodeposition (Kuzyakov, 2002). A substantial fraction of net carbon assimilation goes into the soil as rhizodeposition.

Plant benefits

• Plant access to water and mineral nutrients (esp.N and P)

• Increased protection against abiotic and biotic stresses

Fungus benefits

• Access to fresh photosynthate (labile C)

Parasitic plants - no benefit to fungus

• epidermal/cortical

• 2-5% of plants, 60% of trees

• Basidiomycota, Ascomycota, Mucoromycota

• fruiting bodies, gastronomy

• ??% occurrence

• Pine / spruce, Forest, understory, Ericaceae (arbutoid)

• Fungi same as Ecto

• 78% of plants

• Everything…Except brassica

• Glomeromycota

• NB. Agriculture/crops

• <2% of plants

• Ericaceae, Ascomycota, Basidiomycota

• cranberry, blueberry

• 10% of plants

• Orchidaceae, Basidiomycota

• Ornamental flowers, Vanilla pod

• Less than 2% of plants (Ericaceae)

• Heathland ecosystems and understory of forests

• Inhabit very acidic, raw humus soils

• Poorly researched & understood

• High elevation ecosystems and high latitude

• eg heather in the Scottish highlands

• Fynbos (heather-like shrubs)

• Endemic to Western Cape (South Africa)

• Coastal/mountainous

Extensive saprotrophic capabilities!!

• subfamily Monotropoideae (now Ericaceae)

• Non photosynthetic - lack chlorophyll

• C from the fungus partner (non-mutualistic/ parasitic)

• Myco-heterotroph – C from fungus

• Fungus as linkage to autotrophic plants

• decomposition

Special type of mycorrhiza

• Mantle sheath around root

• Hartig net confined to the epidermis

• invasion of epidermal cells by short hypha (pegs)

• variable classification

1. Nutrient scavenging

• High surface area: mass ratio

• Penetrate small micropores

• AMF specialist

2. Decomposition

• Ericoid and ECF

3. weathering

• mineral

4. Protection/assembly of microbiome

• ECF also mantle!

• Root activity (physical burrowing)

• Production of acidifying substances (H+, organic acids)

• Provide C - fuel for weathering activity of microbes

AM more C in biomass but EcM more C in soil

The common mycorrhizal network (CMN) is conceptualized as any linkage formed by the mycelium of a mycorrhizal fungus among two (or more) host plants (a), irrespective of whether hyphal continuity is present or not

Non-nutritional benefits to their host:

• protection against pathogens

  • Sheath (ECM) = physical barrier

  • Metabolites = biochemical defense

  • Warning through CMN

• improved resistance abiotic stressors (high temperatures, drought, salinity, and flooding)

Biological Bet-hedging:

• organisms suffer decreased fitness in their typical conditions

• but increased fitness in stressful conditions

• Single generation time scale

• Multiple generations time scale (Evolutionary Bet-hedging)

1. Plants have evolved: sophisticated root systems:

• can take up inorganic and even organic N

• produce phosphatases → can take up P

• suppress the AM colonization when nutrients are readily available

2. Co-operations intrinsically unstable in evolutionary timescales

• C fixation is expensive

• Mutations leading to fitness with lower costs favored

• cheating

• destabilise the cooperation

Free Air Carbon Dioxide Enrichment oder kurz FACE ist eine technische Versuchsanordnung, die es ermöglicht, höhere Konzentration von Kohlenstoffdioxid in der Erdatmosphäre im Freiland zu simulieren und ihren Einfluss auf Pflanzen und Ökosysteme zu untersuchen. Bis 2006 gab es 32 FACE-Anlagen weltweit, die sich zu gleichen Teilen auf natürliche und künstliche Ökosysteme verteilten. Die meisten FACE-Anlagen beruhen auf einer am Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) entwickelten Technik: Auf den Probeflächen werden in ringförmiger Anordnung senkrecht stehende Rohre mit Düsen angebracht, aus denen Kohlenstoffdioxid abgegeben werden kann. Diese Vorrichtungen sind kleine Kunststoffrohre bis höhere Türme, da sie stets um einiges höher als die Vegetation sind. Sie nehmen wenig Raum ein, sodass das Mikroklima (Wind, Sonnenstrahlung, Verdunstung) nicht beeinflusst wird. Aus den Röhren wird je nach Windrichtung und -stärke Kohlenstoffdioxid geblasen. Innerhalb der Versuchsfläche ergibt sich so eine vordefinierte Kohlenstoffdioxidkonzentration. Dies kann ein Fixbetrag über der Normalkonzentration (meist + 200 ppm) sein, meist ist es jedoch ein festgelegter Wert, der je nach Versuch zwischen 475 und 660 ppm liegt. Dies sind Werte, die zum Beispiel am Ende des Karbonzeitalters vor rund 300 Millionen Jahren herrschten und nach einigen Berechnungen auch für Ende des 21. Jahrhunderts erwartet werden. Die Versuchsflächen haben einen Durchmesser von 1 bis 30 Meter, meist jedoch über 10 m. Bei einigen Anlagen wird als weitere Komponente die Ozonkonzentration erhöht.

The eddy covariance (also known as eddy correlation and eddy flux) is a key atmospheric measurement technique to measure and calculate vertical turbulent fluxes within atmospheric boundary layers. The method analyses high-frequency wind and scalar atmospheric data series, gas, energy, and momentum,[1] which yields values of fluxesof these properties. It is a statistical method used in meteorology and other applications (micrometeorology, oceanography, hydrology, agricultural sciences, industrial and regulatory applications, etc.) to determine exchange rates of trace gases over natural ecosystems and agricultural fields, and to quantify gas emissions rates from other land and water areas. It is frequently used to estimate momentum, heat, water vapour, carbon dioxide and methane fluxes

1. nutrient source for microorganisms

2. Direct nutrient source for plants-or compounds supporting mobilization of nutrients for plants

3. Puffer of the soil acidity

4. Pedogenetic functions (contributions to weathering, pozolation, etc.)

5. Detoxification of heavy metals and contaminants

1. nutrient source for microbes -> Eutrophication of water bodies

2. Co-allocation of nutrients into ecosystem compartments, where it causes eutrophication-> nutrient loss from the ecosystem

3. Transport of heavy metals and pollutants into the water body

Cell wall:

• hemicelluloses and pectins

• Cellulose

• Lignin

Cell contents:

• sugars and starch

• Proteins

• Proteids

• Nucleic acids

• Lipids

Minor constitutents

• lipid monomers

• Lipid polymers

• Resins

• Tannins

• Pigments

• partially cristallinr polymer consisting soley of glucose monomers

• Linked via beta 1,4 glycosidic bonds

• >10.000 units build one cellulose strand

• Often closely associated with hemicellulose and lignin

• Also eucaryotic single-cell organisms can synthetize

• non cellulose polysaccharides

• Different sugar monomers, linked with glycosidic bonding

• More branched, hydrolyzable with classic acids

• Build many pro- and eucaryotes

Xylanes

• main unit: xylose

• <200 components

• Links cellulose to lignin

Mannane

• main unit mannose

• Linear polymer with storage function

Galaktanes and Arabanes

• main unit: galactose and arabinose

• Strongly branched

• Structural function

Pectines

• polyuronide

• Primarily in hard plant components

• In middle lamella: stability and control of water flux

• a gel produced by most plants in their root tips

• Can absorb large volumes of water

• second most abundant biopolymer in nature

• Complex polymer

• In cell walls of vascular plants (espc. Woody tissue)

• Function: stability, cell linkage, protection from pathogens

• primarily as storage compound

Amylose

• Linear, unbranched

Amylopectin

• branches

• polypeptides of many aminoacids

• Functions: enzymes, structural proteins, transport proteins

• Peptide bond is hydrolyzable

• Easy to decompose in environment

• DNA Information memory

• RNA Information carrier

• Monomer: one base, linked via ribose monomer, phospho-ester strand

• proteins that are covalently linked to further compounds: glucose, lipids, acids

• cannot be dissolved in water

• Very heterogenous group

• Membrane phospho-lipids

• polyphenols

• hydrolyzable tannins=gallotannins

condensed tannins=catechin tannins

• main function: photosynthetic active pigments

• Chlorophyll: porphyrin ring with Mg core

1. all organic compounds in the soil including roots, fauna, microorganisms and former plant residues

Or

1. overall of dead organic compounds in the soil

Labile pool: easy to mineralize (contains structural material and defined chemical compounds)

Stable pool: amorphous, newly formed organic matter with high proportion of macromolecules

1. Prephase of decomposition

2. Initial Phase

3. Fragmentation phase

4. Degradation and transformation phase

5. Mineralization

• biochemical reactions in the organism itself (with its own hydrolytic and oxidative enzymes)

1. degradation of chlorophyll: autumn colors of leaves

2. Starch: gaining sugar (tissue gets sweeter)

3. Proteins: gaining amino acids

• generally the cell itself stays intact

• hydrolysis and oxidation of easily decomposable polymers

• Monomers get leached with the water (sugar, amino acids, organic acids)

• Strong increase of microorganisms who live based on the monomeric compounds

• Complex cell wall compounds are fragmented by the macrofauna, or partially eaten and digested

• Mixing of fragmented cell wall compounds by earthworms, enchytraida and arthropods->provides access for mesofauna such as collembols, mites, nematodes)

• enzymatic cleavage of remaining polymers and of the monomers

• Transformation of organic monomers into inorganic compounds

• Relative accumulation of recalcitrant compounds

• under aerobic conditions the organic matter will be converted in a partially incomplete oxidation via enzymatic systems

• only few microbial groups can decompose

• Peroxidases and catalases (white rot fungi)

• Speciality: is co-metabolic therefore other nutrient source is needed

• Complete decomposition under aerobic conditions