This could be a game changer. From the University of California, Irvine press release, a finding that suggests soil microbes have a negative feedback with temperature increase. This has broad implications for the amount of CO2 emitted estimated in climate models. It had been assumed that as temperature increased, microbes and fungii would increase their CO2 output. Globally, this microbiotic contribution is large. The amount of CO2 released from soils worldwide each year is estimated to be about 8-10 times greater than the amount released by humans.
This study shows that soil microbes won’t go into a an “overdrive” mode when soil temperature increases.
Soil microbes produce less atmospheric CO2 than expected with climate warming
Key players in the carbon cycle, they multiply slowly when overheated
— Irvine, Calif., April 26, 2010 —
The physiology of microbes living underground could determine the amount of carbon dioxide emitted from soil on a warmer Earth, according to a study published online this week in Nature Geoscience.
Researchers at UC Irvine, Colorado State University and the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies found that as global temperatures increase, microbes in soil become less efficient over time at converting carbon in soil into carbon dioxide, a key contributor to climate warming.
Microbes, in the form of bacteria and fungi, use carbon for energy to breathe, or respire, and to grow in size and in number. A model developed by the researchers shows microbes exhaling carbon dioxide furiously for a short period of time in a warmer environment, leaving less carbon to grow on. As warmer temperatures are maintained, the less efficient use of carbon by the microbes causes them to decrease in number, eventually resulting in less carbon dioxide being emitted into the atmosphere.
“Microbes aren’t the destructive agents of global warming that scientists had previously believed,” said Steven Allison, assistant professor of ecology & evolutionary biology at UCI and lead author on the study. “Microbes function like humans: They take in carbon-based fuel and breathe out carbon dioxide. They are the engines that drive carbon cycling in soil. In a balanced environment, plants store carbon in the soil and microbes use that carbon to grow. The microbes then produce enzymes that convert soil carbon into atmospheric carbon dioxide.”
The study, “Soil-Carbon Response to Warming Dependent on Microbial Physiology,” contradicts the results of older models that assume microbes will continue to spew ever-increasing amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere as the climate continues to warm. The new simulations suggest that if microbial efficiency declines in a warmer world, carbon dioxide emissions will fall back to pre-warming levels, a pattern seen in field experiments. But if microbes manage to adapt to the warmth – for instance, through increased enzyme activity – emissions could intensify.
“When we developed a model based on the actual biology of soil microbes, we found that soil carbon may not be lost to the atmosphere as the climate warms,” said Matthew Wallenstein of the Natural Resource Ecology Laboratory at Colorado State University. “Conventional ecosystem models that didn’t include enzymes did not make the same predictions.”
Mark Bradford, assistant professor of terrestrial ecosystem ecology at Yale, said there is intense debate in the scientific community over whether the loss of soil carbon will contribute to global warming. “The challenge we have in predicting this is that the microbial processes causing this loss are poorly understood,” he said. “More research in this area will help reduce uncertainties in climate prediction.”
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Why is it that something well known among many other disciplines of science can be such a startling revelation to climate science?
Organic life on earth is closely linked to carbon cycle simply because WE are made out from CARBON and WATER. Every individual absorbs and emits energy according to its inner structure. As every wave train emits and absorbs discrete amounts of energy, so we. Each “feed”of food which is resonant with its frequency and excrete, emit, accordingly. If more complex, as human beings, feed of several wavelengths: as light, sound, water, etc.
Needless to say warmists prefer longer wavelengths ☺ improper for us.
So now we have a model of the model?
I’m sure they will find something wrong with *this* model while having nothing to say about GCMs.
Another model predicting something that is poorly understood
Geeze Geeze Geeze, the hits keep coming. When are these real scientists going to stop picking on those poor AGW guys???
Couple this with
“Amplification of Global Warming by Carbon-Cycle Feedback Significantly Less Than Thought, Study Suggests”
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/01/100127134721.htm
A greening biosphere
http://svs.gsfc.nasa.gov/vis/a000000/a003400/a003451/index.html
Co2 is lumpy, contrary to the IPCC assumption of it being a well mixed gas
http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2009-196
and what we have is computer model failures.
The new format doesn’t show well on my Firefox browser.Much slower loading too.
Sometimes messing w/a good thing isn’t a good thing.
REPLY: Which version of Firefox on what OS?
CO2 emissions have increased much faster than atmospheric CO2. The deficiency in atmospheric CO2 probably indicates that CO2 is removed from the atmosphere much faster than our CAGW friends want policymakers to believe.
We found something potentially interesting! Give us more money for further studies!
“More research in this area will help reduce uncertainties in climate prediction.”
Not that I think that more research is a bad thing, generally speaking, but I can’t remember the last study that didn’t end with what is essentially a request or justification for further funding. And I can’t help but note that the government provides much if not most climate-related funding, and that politicians are generally far less interested in research than I am, except when it provides them something that they can use for their own agendas.
To my mind, the most revealing hockey-stick graph would be the funding directed towards ‘climate science’ since the weather ceased being the weather and became man-made and catastrophic to boot.
Mark Bradford, assistant professor of terrestrial ecosystem ecology at Yale, said there is intense debate in the scientific community over whether the loss of soil carbon will contribute to global warming….“More research in this area will help reduce uncertainties in climate prediction.”
Translation: “We’re not sure, but a *decrease* in atmospheric CO2 could also lead to global warming. Throw more money at us so we can continue to not be sure about it.”
I don’t think this will be a game changer at all. We are talking about such a small change in an already extremely small percent of atmospheric gases that this will never be observed as a measurable event. It will always and only exist in models. An educated guess with no statistical difference to be had. And mother nature cares not one red cent for models. That is the real game changer.
My opinion, this is not anywhere near a study you can hang your hat on. And it appears that the researchers are grasping for straws, though they may not have intended it to look that way.
It does however, point out the amusing belief by AGW enthusiasts the notion that microbe emissions under warmer temperatures would be worse than we thought! It is a rather silly study used to refute a rather silly notion.
On a somewhat related topic, have any of you actual scientists or others who have access to the literature seen any articles on CO2 released by tree roots growing in limestone? I live in a region where the ground is composed of limestone. Roots from trees and probably other plants grow right through the limestone. I assume the roots secrete some sort of organic acid that decomposes the limestone, allowing them to grow through it. I am wondering how much CO2 this process releases compared to how much is sequestered by the plant material. Also, this would represent a case of a plant feeding itself CO2 wouldn’t it? Limestone is a concentrated source of CO2 so I wouldn’t be surprised if there was a net release of CO2 in this case.
The results aren’t surprising–had the opposite as hypothesized by the warmers been earth’s fate, the earth would have tipped a long time ago to a steamy hot planet with most if not all of the ocean’s water diffused throughout the atmosphere. That this isn’t the case shouldn’t surprise anybody.
The warmers apparently proceed on the belief that our current climate is as warm as the earth has ever gotten. They should study more “geo” and less “theo”.
A little knowledge is a dangerous thing. (Don’t know who said it)
“The greatest obstacle to discovery is not ignorance — it is the illusion of knowledge!”
(Daniel J. Boorstin, winner of the 1974 Pulitzer Prize)
The write-up confuses me: Is less CO2 produced because (i) warmer microbes exhale CO2 “furiously” for a short period of time, “leaving less carbon to grow on”, or (ii) warmer microbes make “less efficient use of carbon.” The two possibilities seem mutually exclusive, unless the microbes somehow know how much carbon they have left to be furious about.
The first explanation is the only one consistent with our observation of tropical soils, i.e. they are depleted in organics by active microbes, which remain ready to oxidize any new carbon that becomes available.
Fortuitously, the authors allow themselves an out for the purpose of CAGW fear-mongering: The microbes might adapt (in a way they haven’t for billions of years), so CO2 “emissions could intensify.”
Pamela-
I respectfully disagree. Enzymes are very temperature sensitive, that is the reason you are a homeotherm, and to think that soil microbes wil simply increase their carbon poutput because the temperature rises is absurd. On the other hand, if their are more soils where microbes are more active for longer periods of the year, the output may increase. Of course, if the temp rise goes beyond the optimum for the enzymes to function to respire, then the amount of carbon will decrease. To think this study is “grasping at straws” is absurd, to me at least.
I would add that the greatest discoveries in science are often made at the interface between two disciplines, where we know enough to come to real conclusions if only the scientists on both sides could see through the ivory wall of publishing in and reading different journals.
Is the current estimate of the natural carbon flux actually measured?
Or is it based on a model?
When I use Knorr’s 0.55 decay rate for atmospheric CO2, I come up with a residence time (RT) of ~15 years (with 95% cycled out of the atmosphere within 5 years).
When I use the CDIAC anthropogenic emissions history back to 1751 and the 0.55 decay rate, I back calculate a natural CO2 flux to the atmosphere of 437 GtC in 1751, gradually rising to 592 GtC in 2006. The highest value I can find for a pre-industrial natural flux to the atmosphere is 244 GtC from the TOTEM model.
Is the natural carbon flux measured? Is it model-derived? Is it just assumed? Could the natural carbon flux be more than twice the initial conditions assumed in the TOTEM model?
Another in a long list of erroneous assumptions. At what point do we know enough about a field of study to actually be doing science with respect to that field. ‘Climate Science’ seems to be at the point of blind men trying to determine if they are examining the same elephant, not yet at the point of defining what that elephant is.
stevengoddard says: April 28, 2010 at 5:50 am
CO2 emissions have increased much faster than atmospheric CO2. The deficiency in atmospheric CO2 probably indicates that CO2 is removed from the atmosphere much faster than our CAGW friends want policymakers to believe.
After many years of rock hunting in Colorado, one can’t help but notice the calcium carbonate coating that occurs on rocks here. I wonder how much carbon is sequestered by that method. It is not as obvious as some of the monolithic deposits, but is everywhere and must be a substantial amount.
New format is performing just fine Down Under (Mandurah, Western Australia) running Firefox 3.6.3
Is this why there is an increase in CO2 500 to 800 years after warming and a decrease 500 to 800 years after cooling? Warming causes an increase in microbial activity, therefore causing more atmospheric CO2. And vice versa?
I think it would be highly ironic if our minor 1000-year climate cycles were eventually found to be biota-related and analogous to the classic predator-prey cycles. That is where increasing prey animals allow the predator population to rise until they begin to devour the prey faster than this food source can reproduce. Then the numbers of both populations crash until there are so few predators left that the prey population can start rising again.
First used by Alexander Pope (1688 – 1744) in An Essay on Criticism, 1709:
“A little learning is a dangerous thing; drink deep, or taste not the Pierian spring: there shallow draughts intoxicate the brain, and drinking largely sobers us again.”
I feel pedantic today.Good quote by Boorstin