EFFECTS OF SOIL NUTRIENT AVAILABILITY ON INVESTMENT IN ACQUISITION OF N AND P IN HAWAIIAN RAIN FORESTS

By K. Treseder, P. Vitousek. 2001

468 citations recorded by the source corpus.

We determined the influence of nutrient availability on the mechanisms used by plants to acquire nitrogen and phosphorus from the soil. Extracellular acid phosphatase production, mycorrhizal colonization, and N and P uptake capacities were measured in control, N-, and P-fertilized forests in three sites that varied in nutrient status from N limited to relatively fertile to P limited. Nitrogen fertilization increased extracellular phosphatase activity in all sites. Phosphorus additions consistently reduced phosphatase activity, mycorrhizal colonization, and P uptake capacity across sites. Our results indicate that these plants efficiently allocate resources to nutrient acquisition as suggested by an economic model. Investment in acquisition of a nutrient was greatest when that nutrient was limiting to growth, and plants appeared to allocate excess N to construction of extracellular phosphatases to acquire P. This increase in phosphatase production with N fertilization implies that even P-limited systems might respond to N deposition with greater productivity.

Subfields: Plant Science

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/a07043c6892b74226fbe109a9819a814d12cef9a

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Citations in the corpus

Evolutionary-Economic Principles as Regulators of Soil Enzyme Production and Ecosystem Function (2010, background): “Moreover, phosphatase activity has been shown to be inversely related to inorganic P availability in both aquatic and soil systems (Chróst 1991; Olander and Vitousek 2000; Treseder and Vitousek 2001; Allison et al. 2007b).”
Biological and Geochemical Sinks for Phosphorus in Soil from a Wet Tropical Forest (2004, background): “Fertilization with N might be expected to increase microbial activity and/or biomass, resulting in increased P demand and immobilization of tracer P, unless there is an alternative source of P. Previous studies at this site have shown that long-term fertilization with N increased production of phosp”
Nitrogen inputs accelerate phosphorus cycling rates across a wide variety of terrestrial ecosystems. (2012, unknown): “Although phosphatases are clearly advantageous, the actual return per unit of phosphatase investment is largely unknown (but see Treseder & Vitousek, 2001; Wang et al., 2007).”
Terrestrial phosphorus limitation: mechanisms, implications, and nitrogen-phosphorus interactions. (2010, background): “130 Conversely, additions of N can allow organisms to produce more extracellular phosphatase 131 enzymes that cleave ester-P bonds in soil organic matter (McGill and Cole 1981, Olander and 132 Vitousek 2000, Treseder and Vitousek 2001, Wang et al. 2007) – increasing local availability of 133 P.”
Species‐specific responses of foliar nutrients to long‐term nitrogen and phosphorus additions in a lowland tropical forest (2014, result): “…of leaf nutrient resorption is genetically constrained by adaptations to generally low-P conditions, a finding comparable to the genetic differences seen among Metrosideros polymorpha populations on high- and low-P soils in Hawaii (Harrington, Fownes & Vitousek 2001; Treseder & Vitousek 2001).”
Increasing phosphorus limitation along three successional forests in southern China (2013, background): “…glaberrima, which are small trees and not as productive as the dominant tree species, can have the capability to invest N into P acquisition and result in relatively high APA because of high N content in leaves or roots (Treseder and Vitousek 2001; Houlton et al. 2008; Marklein and Houlton 2012).”
Stoichiometric flexibility in response to fertilization along gradients of environmental and organismal nutrient richness (2015, background): “Terrestrial biota C:N tended to decline with P fertilization, suggesting that greater P availability can stimulate N acquisition (Treseder and Vitousek 2001); our regression results suggest that this effect is governed by biotic P status.”
A model of biogeochemical cycles of carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus including symbiotic nitrogen fixation and phosphatase production (2007, methodology): “In this study we assume a C cost of 6 g C (gN) 1 for SNF [Thornley and Cannell, 2000] and a N cost of 15 g N (g P) 1 for biochemical P mineralization [Treseder and Vitousek, 2001].”
Does phosphorus limitation promote species-rich plant communities? (2011, unknown): “These results fit well with other studies indicating that N limitation favours plants with a high biomass investment in roots and root length, and a high photosynthetic activity, growth rate and nitrogen productivity, in contrast, to P limitation where investments in P acquisition and storage, a lon”