Abstract

Forests play an important role in global carbon cycles. However, the lack of available information on carbon stocks in dead organic matter, including woody debris and litter, reduces the reliability of assessing the carbon cycles in entire forest ecosystems. Here we estimate that the national DOM carbon stock in the period of 2004–2008 is 925 ± 54 Tg, with an average density of 5.95 ± 0.35 Mg C ha−1. Over the past two decades from periods of 1984−1988 to 2004−2008, the national dead organic matter carbon stock has increased by 6.7 ± 2.2 Tg carbon per year, primarily due to increasing forest area. Temperature and precipitation increase the carbon density of woody debris, but decrease that of litter. Additionally, the woody debris increases significantly with above ground biomass and forest age. Our results can improve estimates of the carbon budget in China's forests and for better understanding of effects of climate and stand characteristics on dead organic matter distribution.

Details

Title
Carbon stocks and changes of dead organic matter in China's forests
Author
Zhu, Jianxiao 1 ; Hu, Huifeng 2 ; Tao, Shengli 1 ; Chi, Xiulian 1 ; Li, Peng 1 ; Lai, Jiang 1 ; Ji, Chengjun 1 ; Zhu, Jiangling 1 ; Tang, Zhiyao 1   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Pan, Yude 3 ; Birdsey, Richard A 4 ; He, Xinhua 5   VIAFID ORCID Logo  ; Fang, Jingyun 6 

1  Department of Ecology, College of Urban and Environmental Science, and Key Laboratory for Earth Surface Processes of the Ministry of Education, Peking University, Beijing, China 
2  State Key Laboratory of Vegetation and Environmental Change, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China 
3  US Department of Agriculture Forest Service, Newtown Square, PA, USA 
4  Woods Hole Research Center, Falmouth, MA, USA 
5  Centre of Excellence for Soil Biology, College of Resources and Environment, Southwest University, Chongqing, China 
6  Department of Ecology, College of Urban and Environmental Science, and Key Laboratory for Earth Surface Processes of the Ministry of Education, Peking University, Beijing, China; State Key Laboratory of Vegetation and Environmental Change, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China 
Pages
1-10
Publication year
2017
Publication date
Jul 2017
Publisher
Nature Publishing Group
e-ISSN
20411723
Source type
Scholarly Journal
Language of publication
English
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-017-00207-1
ProQuest document ID
1923980755
Copyright
© 2017. This work is published under http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/ (the “License”). Notwithstanding the ProQuest Terms and Conditions, you may use this content in accordance with the terms of the License.