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Mechanisms Involved in Soil Ammonium Production in a Mauritia flexuosa Palm Swamp Community

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Abstract

When soils are water saturated, the reduced forms of soil nitrogen such as ammonium are favored. Under anaerobiosis, ammonium production has been explained by several mechanisms such as organic nitrogen mineralization (ONM), dissimilatory nitrate reduction to ammonium (DNRA) and the release of adsorbed ammonium during microbial reduction of iron oxides (MRFeO). Nevertheless, in anaerobic soils the dominance of one mechanism over the others is still debated. Nitrogen appears to influence the reproductive dynamics of Mauritia flexuosa, the dominant canopy species of the “morichal” ecosystem. Even though M. flexuosa has been classified as “vulnerable”, ammonium production in morichal soils is not well understood. Considering this, we evaluated in a morichal soil from SE Venezuela, the mechanisms associated with ammonium production under anaerobic conditions. To this end, we designed an anaerobic incubation experiment to follow over time the concentrations of nitrate, extractable ferrous iron and ammonium together with the activity of β-glucosaminidase as an index of N mineralization. To account for the relative importance of ONM, DNRA and MRFeO on ammonium production, we used multiple linear regression models. The results showed that the three mechanisms are involved in ammonium production. However, ONM is the main source of ammonium in the initial 15 days of soil incubation, while MRFeO explains ammonium produced after 15 days of soil incubation. However, under climate change scenarios these mechanisms may be altered, thereby increasing the N limitation of morichales and consequently its vulnerability. Since morichales are threatened ecosystems, that play a key ecological, economic and cultural role, studies on the soil nitrogen dynamics are important to design and evaluate effective management, conservation and protection strategies. This study can be a relevant contribution in this area.

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Acknowledgements

This research was financed entirely by the Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Científicas (IVIC), project No 668 awarded to Dr. N. Chacón. We would like to thank Dr. Erich Inselsbacher and Dr. Pedro Borges for their critical comments on previous version of this manuscript. We are very grateful with the reviewers for their careful revision and valuable comments on the manuscript. We also wish to thank MSc. Mariela López for language editing that improved the quality of the manuscript. We wish to express our gratitude to Mr. JL Vallés for his assistance during the field work.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centro de Ecología Instituto Venezolano de Investigaciones Científicas, Apdo. 20632, Caracas, 1020-A, Venezuela

    Noemí Chacón, Rafael Herrera, Carlos Méndez & Enrique Quintero-Torres

  2. REforeST group, Research Institute of Water and Environmental Engineering, Universitat Politècnica de València, València, Spain

    Rafael Herrera

  3. Instituto de Ciencias de la Tierra, Facultad de Ciencias, Universidad Central de Venezuela, Caracas, Venezuela

    Alessia Bastianoni

Authors
  1. Noemí Chacón
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  2. Rafael Herrera
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  3. Carlos Méndez
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  4. Alessia Bastianoni
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  5. Enrique Quintero-Torres
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Correspondence to Noemí Chacón.

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Chacón, N., Herrera, R., Méndez, C. et al. Mechanisms Involved in Soil Ammonium Production in a Mauritia flexuosa Palm Swamp Community. Wetlands 38, 641–646 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13157-017-0979-0

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