A mesocosm study on carbon transfer mechanisms from deadwood to litter through fungal hyphal growth

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Ullah, Mohammad Rahmat ; Wegend, Katrin ; Kellner, Harald ; Peršoh, Derek ; Borken, Werner:
A mesocosm study on carbon transfer mechanisms from deadwood to litter through fungal hyphal growth.
In: Applied Soil Ecology. Bd. 207 (2025) . - 105939.
ISSN 0929-1393
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.apsoil.2025.105939

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Abstract

Hyphae-forming fungi play a critical role in decomposing deadwood and plant litter, utilizing a variety of resources in forest ecosystems. While the redistribution of nitrogen and phosphorus by fungal hyphae between deadwood and soil has been established, the translocation of carbon (C) and its subsequent utilization remains unexplored. This study examines the fungal-mediated transfer of 13C-cellulose from deadwood of European beech and Norway spruce to Norway spruce litter from an Oi/Oe horizon. We used a mesocosm double-chamber controlled system with a perforated intersection, including beech and spruce deadwoods (chamber I) and spruce litter (chamber II). After fungal hyphae growth in the intersection between the two chambers, mesocosms were incubated for 8–10 weeks at 20 °C in the dark. Following a pre-treatment phase, 13C-cellulose was added to half of the deadwood chambers while the other half served as control without cellulose addition. The transfer of 13C-cellulose from deadwood to spruce litter was assessed by measuring the abundance of 13C in respiration and microbial biomass within the spruce litter. After incubation, the 13C-cellulose recovered in spruce litter was higher for both respiration (7.75 ± 0.98 %) and microbial biomass (1.66 ± 1.01 %) for beech compared to the spruce deadwood (3.88 ± 1.07 % in respiration and 1.55 ± 1.37 % in microbial biomass). This indicates that, in both deadwood setups, more 13C was recovered in respiration than in microbial biomass. Molecular analysis of the fungal hyphae at the intersection between the deadwood and spruce litter chambers identified Clitopilus baronii and Kuehneromyces mutabilis as the common and active deadwood-decaying fungi facilitating significant 13C transfer (240–270 δ‰ in respiration, and 100–160 δ‰ in MBC), while the baseline without 13C was −25 δ‰. This research provides new insights into the mechanisms of C transfer from deadwood to litter, suggesting an enhanced decomposition of litter by deadwood decaying fungi.