Soil moisture impacts the tundra carbon balance in a changing climate

There is growing recognition that soil moisture plays a crucial role in regulating the response of tundra carbon cycling to climate warming.

Arctic tundra is Earth’s coldest terrestrial biome after glaciers, yet this far northern biome is warming three to four times faster than the global average (Rantanen et al., 2022). Importantly, the Arctic tundra biome stores ~160 Pg C in the top 1 m of permafrost soils (Loranty et al., 2016), which is equivalent to ~17 years of humanity’s fossil fuel emissions at current levels. Continued warming could cause a significant portion of this carbon to be released into the atmosphere over the coming century (Schuur et al., 2022), therefore it is crucial to better understand the carbon balance of tundra ecosystems including climate change impacts.

Read more in Global Change Biology.