Since land plants emerged from swampy coastlines over 400 million years ago, they have played a fundamental role in shaping the Earth system. Roots and associated fungi increase rock weathering rates, providing access to nutrients, while altering atmospheric CO2. As soils weather, the dissolution of primary minerals forces plants to rely on recycling and atmospheric deposition of rock-derived nutrients. Thus, for many terrestrial ecosystems, weathering ultimately constrains primary production (carbon uptake) and decomposition (carbon loss). These constraints are most acute in agricultural systems, which rely on mined fertilizer rather than the recycling of organic material to maintain production. Humans now mine similar amounts of some elements as weather out of rocks globally. This increase in supply has myriad environmental consequences.
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Research Article|
August 01, 2019
How Plants Enhance Weathering and How Weathering is Important to Plants
Stephen Porder
Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, Brown University, Box G-W, 80 Waterman Street, Providence, RI 02912, USA
E-mail: Stephen_porder@brown.edu
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E-mail: Stephen_porder@brown.edu
Publisher: Mineralogical Society of America
First Online:
29 Jul 2019
Online ISSN: 1811-5217
Print ISSN: 1811-5209
Copyright © 2019 by the Mineralogical Society of America
Mineralogical Society of America
Elements (2019) 15 (4): 241–246.
Article history
First Online:
29 Jul 2019
Citation
Stephen Porder; How Plants Enhance Weathering and How Weathering is Important to Plants. Elements 2019;; 15 (4): 241–246. doi: https://doi.org/10.2138/gselements.15.4.241
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Index Terms/Descriptors
- agriculture
- alteration
- atmosphere
- biochemistry
- biogenic processes
- carbon
- carbon cycle
- carbon dioxide
- ecology
- ecosystems
- erosion rates
- fertilizers
- fixation
- geochemical cycle
- global
- human activity
- mining
- nitrogen
- nutrients
- organic compounds
- phosphorus
- Plantae
- recycling
- roots
- solution
- weathering
- weathering rates
- world ocean
- primary production
- nutrient limitation
- Fungi
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