Adjustment of microbial nitrogen use efficiency to carbon:nitrogen imbalances regulates soil nitrogen cycling

Microbial nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) describes the partitioning of organic N taken up between growth and the release of inorganic N to the environment (that is, N mineralization), and is thus central to our understanding of N cycling. Here we report empirical evidence that microbial decomposer co...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Nature communications 2014-04, Vol.5 (1), p.3694-3694, Article 3694
Main Authors: Mooshammer, Maria, Wanek, Wolfgang, Hämmerle, Ieda, Fuchslueger, Lucia, Hofhansl, Florian, Knoltsch, Anna, Schnecker, Jörg, Takriti, Mounir, Watzka, Margarete, Wild, Birgit, Keiblinger, Katharina M, Zechmeister-Boltenstern, Sophie, Richter, Andreas
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
631/326/2565
704/158/47
Ammonium Compounds - metabolism
Carbon - analysis
Humanities and Social Sciences
Metabolic Networks and Pathways - physiology
Microbiota - physiology
multidisciplinary
Nitrogen Cycle - physiology
Science
Science (multidisciplinary)
Soil - chemistry
Soil Microbiology
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Summary:Microbial nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) describes the partitioning of organic N taken up between growth and the release of inorganic N to the environment (that is, N mineralization), and is thus central to our understanding of N cycling. Here we report empirical evidence that microbial decomposer communities in soil and plant litter regulate their NUE. We find that microbes retain most immobilized organic N (high NUE), when they are N limited, resulting in low N mineralization. However, when the metabolic control of microbial decomposers switches from N to C limitation, they release an increasing fraction of organic N as ammonium (low NUE). We conclude that the regulation of NUE is an essential strategy of microbial communities to cope with resource imbalances, independent of the regulation of microbial carbon use efficiency, with significant effects on terrestrial N cycling. Nitrogen availability in soils is predominantly controlled by microorganisms, yet our understanding of their organic nitrogen use is limited. Mooshammer et al. show that microbial nitrogen use efficiency is dependent on resource stoichiometry and substrate type.
ISSN:2041-1723
2041-1723
DOI:10.1038/ncomms4694