Warming effects on pelagic carbon metabolism is related to substrate composition and bacterioplankton community history

Abstract

Investigating the critical role of carbon cycling feedback to warming is essential for understanding future biosphere development. One of the current challenges is that the warming effect on carbon cycling is inconsistent across various aquatic ecosystems. It was postulated that the composition of dissolved organic matter (DOM) and the microbial community influenced the response of carbon metabolism to warming. To test our hypothesis, we conducted a microcosm study in which three key factors were manipulated: initial DOM composition (adjusting the ratio of autochthonous and allochthonous substrates), bacterioplankton community history (characterized by two distinct sources of bacterioplankton community), and temperature (ambient and 4 °C warming). The results demonstrated that the initial composition of DOM exerted a dominant influence on carbon metabolism. In contrast, the history of bacterioplankton community influenced the active taxa and functional traits. The log-response ratio approach revealed that the warming treatment affected bacterial carbon demand (BCD) and bacterial growth efficiency (BGE). A piecewise structural equation model further validated the paths by which warming altered BCD, particularly by changing the consumption of fluorescent DOM, and altered BGE, by affecting the active bacterioplankton. Our study demonstrated that the impact of warming on carbon cycling was context-dependent, with particular relevance to the history and dynamics of bacterioplankton community in this process. Given ongoing changes in lacustrine environments, a more comprehensive understanding of the interactions between DOM and microbes is essential for the accurate prediction of future carbon cycling.