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Soil carbon is present in two forms: inorganic and organic. Soil inorganic carbon consists of mineral forms of carbon, either from weathering of parent material, or from reaction of soil minerals with atmospheric CO 2. Carbonate minerals are the dominant form of soil carbon in desert climates. Soil organic carbon is present as soil organic matter.
This is 3.3 times the amount of the atmospheric pool at 750 gigatons and 4.5 times the biotic pool at 560 gigatons. The pool of organic carbon, which occurs primarily in the form of SOM, accounts for approximately 1,550 gigatons of the total global carbon pool, [14] [15] with soil inorganic
Humus has a characteristic black or dark brown color and is an accumulation of organic carbon. Besides the three major soil horizons of (A) surface/topsoil, (B) subsoil, and (C) substratum, some soils have an organic horizon (O) on the very surface. Hard bedrock (R) is not in a strict sense soil. In classical [1] soil science, humus is the dark
Soil carbon sponge (or soil sponge) [1] is porous, well-aggregated soil [2] in good health, better able to absorb and retain water.Australian microbiologist and climatologist, Walter Jehne, articulated the concept of the soil carbon sponge in his 2017 paper, Regenerate Earth, [3] connecting soil carbon with a restored water cycle [4] able induce planetary cooling through evaporative cooling ...
When the organic component of a soil is substantial, the soil is called organic soil rather than mineral soil. A soil is called organic if: Mineral fraction is 0% clay and organic matter is 20% or more; Mineral fraction is 0% to 50% clay and organic matter is between 20% and 30%; Mineral fraction is 50% or more clay and organic matter 30% or ...
Carbon is its key component comprising about 58% by weight. Simple assessment of total organic matter is obtained by measuring organic carbon in soil. Living organisms (including roots) contribute about 15% of the total organic matter in soil. These are critical to operation of the soil carbon cycle. What follows refers to the remaining 85% of ...
Soil aggregation can physically protect organic carbon from decay by soil microbes. [19] More aggregate formation can result in more soil carbon storage. There is much evidence that arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi increase soil aggregate formation, and that aggregate formation may be mediated by the arbuscular mycorrhizal protein glomalin . [ 20 ]
The soil microbial population releases exoenzymes (1), which depolymerize the dead organic matter (2). The microbial decomposers assimilate the monomers (3) and either mineralize these into inorganic compounds like carbon dioxide or ammonium (4) or use the monomers for their biosynthetic needs.