Heterogeneity in soil carbon stocks: Data-based or database-based?

Malhotra, Avni

Wednesday, August 5, 2020

Avni Malhotra, Earth System Science, Stanford University, Stanford, CA, Katerina Georgiou, Earth System Science, Stanford University, Katherine E. Todd-Brown, University of Florida, FL, Stevan Earl, Global Institute of Sustainability, Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, Jennifer W. Harden, Stanford University, Will R. Wieder, INSTAAR, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO and Rob Jackson, Earth System Science, Woods Institute for the Environment, and Precourt Institute for Energy, Stanford University, Stanford, CA

Soils are often the ‘black box’ and ‘elephant in the room’ in ecological studies, even though soil carbon is closely tied to both fine-scale food-web and plant ecology, and global-scale biosphere-climate feedbacks. Thus, quantifying stocks and drivers of soil carbon is critical and has led to various database compilations. But do different databases provide the same answers to ecological questions? To explore this, we compared data formats and content across soil databases and analyzed how database structures influenced global soil carbon stocks and predictors. We find that predictor importance varied across databases and provide implications for future database users.

INS 18 Abstract - Heterogeneity in soil carbon stocks: Data-based or database-based?