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Interpreting the temperature-induced response of ammonia oxidizing microorganisms in soil using nitrogen isotope fractionation

  • SOILS, SEC 5 • SOIL AND LANDSCAPE ECOLOGY • RESEARCH ARTICLE
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Abstract

Purpose

Although nitrification plays a key role in the fate of soil nitrogen (N) under global warming, little information is available for the nitrifiers’ response to changing temperatures. Nitrogen isotope fractionation associated with nitrification can be a proxy of nitrifiers’ sensitivity to changing temperature. We hypothesized that the temperature-induced balance between the transport of substrate NH +4 into the microbial cell (supply) and the intracellular NH +4 oxidation (consumption) governs the intracellular NH +4 concentration and then affects nitrification rates and associated isotope fractionations. This study was conducted to understand the microbial response of NH +4 oxidation to changing temperatures by examining the effect of changing temperature on nitrification rate and apparent isotope fractionation.

Materials and methods

A batch aerobic incubation was conducted with a sandy loam soil over 150 days at three different soil temperatures: 10, 20, and 30°C. After applying ammonium sulfate, we analyzed the temporal variations in the concentrations and the isotopic compositions of soil inorganic N and calculated nitrification rates and isotope fractionation factors.

Results and discussion

Net nitrification rate increased with increasing soil temperature, while apparent isotope fractionation factors decreased. The increased net nitrification rate was attributable to both an increase in NH +4 transport across cell membranes and an increase in intracellular enzymatic activity. Meanwhile, the decreased apparent isotope fractionation suggested that NH +4 oxidation rate became faster than NH +4 transport rate, resulting in a decrease in intracellular NH +4 concentrations.

Conclusions

Although intracellular NH +4 transport and oxidation were not directly measured in this study, it is concluded that NH +4 oxidation is more sensitive to increasing temperature than NH +4 transport judging from the apparent N isotopic fractionation associated with NH +4 concentration changes (mainly by nitrification) under different temperature regimes.

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Acknowledgments

Three anonymous reviewers provided helpful comments and criticism, which improved the manuscript. The authors acknowledge with appreciation Dr. Sang-Mo Lee of the National Instrumentation Center for Environmental Management, Seoul National University for helping the use of stable isotope ratio mass spectrometer and Mr. Jae-Min Kim and Ms. Min-Jin Lee for their laboratory assistance in N isotope analysis. This research was funded not only by the Brain Korea 21 Program of the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology in Korea but also by the support of “Cooperative Research Program for Agriculture Science and Technology Development (Project No. PJ007455),” Rural Development Administration, South Korea.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Agricultural Biotechnology, Seoul National University, Seoul, 151–921, South Korea

    Seok-In Yun

  2. Department of Agricultural Biotechnology and Research Institute for Agriculture and Life Sciences, Seoul National University, Seoul, 151–921, South Korea

    Hee-Myong Ro

  3. Department of Rural and Biosystems Engineering, Chonnam National University, Gwangju, 500–757, South Korea

    Woo-Jung Choi

  4. Department of Environmental and Biological Chemistry, Chungbuk National University, Cheongju, 361–763, South Korea

    Gwang-Hyun Han

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  1. Seok-In Yun
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  2. Hee-Myong Ro
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  3. Woo-Jung Choi
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Correspondence to Hee-Myong Ro.

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Responsible editor: Ji-Zheng He

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Yun, SI., Ro, HM., Choi, WJ. et al. Interpreting the temperature-induced response of ammonia oxidizing microorganisms in soil using nitrogen isotope fractionation. J Soils Sediments 11, 1253–1261 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-011-0380-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11368-011-0380-1

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