Modeled energetics of bacterial communities in ancient subzero brines

Cryopeg brines are isolated volumes of hypersaline water in subzero permafrost. The cryopeg system at Utqiaġvik, Alaska, is estimated to date back to 40 ka BP or earlier, a remnant of a late Pleistocene Ocean. Surprisingly, the cryopeg brines contain high concentrations of organic carbon, including extracellular polysaccharides, and high densities of bacteria. How can these physiologically extreme, old, and geologically isolated systems support such an ecosystem? This study addresses this question by examining the energetics of the Utqiaġvik cryopeg brine ecosystem. Using literature-derived assumptions and new measurements on archived borehole materials, we first estimated the quantity of organic carbon when the system formed. We then considered two bacterial growth trajectories to calculate the lower and upper bounds of the cell-specific metabolic rate of these communities. These bounds represent the first community estimates of metabolic rate in a subzero hypersaline environment. To assess the plausibility of the different growth trajectories, we developed a model of the organic carbon cycle and applied it to three borehole scenarios. We also used dissolved inorganic carbon and nitrogen measurements to independently estimate the metabolic rate. The model reconstructs the growth trajectory of the microbial community and predicts the present-day cell density and organic carbon content. Model input included measured rates of the in-situ enzymatic conversion of particulate to dissolved organic carbon under subzero brine conditions. A sensitivity analysis of model parameters was performed, revealing an interplay between growth rate, cell-specific metabolic rate, and extracellular enzyme activity. This approach allowed us to identify plausible growth trajectories consistent with the observed bacterial densities in the cryopeg brines. We found that the cell-specific metabolic rate in this system is relatively high compared to marine sediments. We attribute this finding to the need to invest energy in the production of extracellular enzymes, for generating bioavailable carbon from particulate organic carbon, and the production of extracellular polysaccharides for cryoprotection and osmoprotection. These results may be relevant to other isolated systems in the polar regions of Earth and to possible ice-bound brines on worlds such as Europa, Enceladus, and Mars

Endurance of larch forest ecosystems in eastern Siberia under warming trends

第6回極域科学シンポジウム分野横断セッション：[IA] 急変する北極気候システム及びその全球的な影響の総合的解明―GRENE北極気候変動研究事業研究成果報告2015―11月19日（木）　国立極地研究所１階交流アトリウ

2016 Snow Melt in the NGEE-Arctic Teller Research Watershed

In April 2016, daily transects were made across the Teller Road Basin to begin the several year process of characterizing the largest event in the northern hydrologic year: snow melt. This year was an experiment to see how much could be accomplished (a full suite of time intensive measurements) during this interval.The Next-Generation Ecosystem Experiments (NGEE Arctic) project is supported by the Office of Biological and Environmental Research in the DOE Office of Science

Inter-annual variation in CH4 efflux and the associated processes with reference to delta-13C-, delta-D-CH4 at the Lowland of Indigirka River in Northeastern Siberia

第6回極域科学シンポジウム分野横断セッション：[IA] 急変する北極気候システム及びその全球的な影響の総合的解明―GRENE北極気候変動研究事業研究成果報告2015―11月19日（木）　国立極地研究所１階交流アトリウ

Endurance of larch forest ecosystems in eastern Siberia under warming trends

The larch (Larix spp.) forest in eastern Siberia is the world’s largest coniferous forest. Its persistence is considered to depend on near-surface permafrost, and thus forecast warming over the 21st century and consequent degradation of near-surface permafrost is expected to affect the larch forest in Siberia. However, predictions of these effects vary greatly, and many uncertainties remain about land-atmosphere interactions within the ecosystem. We developed an integrated land surface model to analyze how the Siberian larch forest will react to current warming trends. This model analyzed interactions between vegetation dynamics and thermo-hydrology, although it does not consider many processes those are considered to affect productivity response to a changing climate (e.g., nitrogen limitation, waterlogged soil, heat stress, and change in species composition). The model showed and showed that, under climatic conditions predicted under gradual and rapid warming, the annual net primary production of larch increased about 2 and 3 times, respectively, by the end of the 21st century compared with that in the previous century. Soil water content during the larch-growing season showed no obvious trend, even when surface permafrost was allowed to decay and result in sub-surface runoff. A sensitivity test showed that the forecast temperature and precipitation trends extended larch leafing days and reduced water shortages during the growing season, thereby increasing productivity. The integrated model also satisfactorily reconstructed latitudinal gradients in permafrost presence, soil moisture, tree leaf area index, and biomass over the entire larch-dominated area in eastern Siberia. Projected changes to ecosystem hydrology and larch productivity at this geographical scale were consistent with those from site-level simulation. This study reduces the uncertainty surrounding the impact of current climate trends on this globally important carbon reservoir, and it demonstrates the need to consider complex ecological processes to make accurate predictions

Arctic tundra shrubification: a review of mechanisms and impacts on ecosystem carbon balance

Vegetation composition shifts, and in particular, shrub expansion across the Arctic tundra are some of the most important and widely observed responses of high-latitude ecosystems to rapid climate warming. These changes in vegetation potentially alter ecosystem carbon balances by affecting a complex set of soil-plant-atmosphere interactions. In this review, we synthesize the literature on (a) observed shrub expansion, (b) key climatic and environmental controls and mechanisms that affect shrub expansion, (c) impacts of shrub expansion on ecosystem carbon balance, and (d) research gaps and future directions to improve process representations in land models. A broad range of evidence, including in-situ observations, warming experiments, and remotely sensed vegetation indices have shown increases in growth and abundance of woody plants, particularly tall deciduous shrubs, and advancing shrublines across the circumpolar Arctic. This recent shrub expansion is affected by several interacting factors including climate warming, accelerated nutrient cycling, changing disturbance regimes, and local variation in topography and hydrology. Under warmer conditions, tall deciduous shrubs can be more competitive than other plant functional types in tundra ecosystems because of their taller maximum canopy heights and often dense canopy structure. Competitive abilities of tall deciduous shrubs vs herbaceous plants are also controlled by variation in traits that affect carbon and nutrient investments and retention strategies in leaves, stems, and roots. Overall, shrub expansion may affect tundra carbon balances by enhancing ecosystem carbon uptake and altering ecosystem respiration, and through complex feedback mechanisms that affect snowpack dynamics, permafrost degradation, surface energy balance, and litter inputs. Observed and projected tall deciduous shrub expansion and the subsequent effects on surface energy and carbon balances may alter feedbacks to the climate system. Land models, including those integrated in Earth System Models, need to account for differences in plant traits that control competitive interactions to accurately predict decadal- to centennial-scale tundra vegetation and carbon dynamics

A decade of remotely sensed observations highlight complex processes linked to coastal permafrost bluff erosion in the Arctic

Eroding permafrost coasts are likely indicators and integrators of changes in the Arctic System as they are susceptible to the combined effects of declining sea ice extent, increases in open water duration, more frequent and impactful storms, sea-level rise, and warming permafrost. However, few observation sites in the Arctic have yet to link decadal-scale erosion rates with changing environmental conditions due to temporal data gaps. This study increases the temporal fidelity of coastal permafrost bluff observations using near-annual high spatial resolution (<1 m) satellite imagery acquired between 2008–2017 for a 9 km segment of coastline at Drew Point, Beaufort Sea coast, Alaska. Our results show that mean annual erosion for the 2007–2016 decade was 17.2 m yr−1, which is 2.5 times faster than historic rates, indicating that bluff erosion at this site is likely responding to changes in the Arctic System. In spite of a sustained increase in decadal-scale mean annual erosion rates, mean open water season erosion varied from 6.7 m yr−1 in 2010 to more than 22.0 m yr−1 in 2007, 2012, and 2016. This variability provided a range of coastal responses through which we explored the different roles of potential environmental drivers. The lack of significant correlations between mean open water season erosion and the environmental variables compiled in this study indicates that we may not be adequately capturing the environmental forcing factors, that the system is conditioned by long-term transient effects or extreme weather events rather than annual variability, or that other not yet considered factors may be responsible for the increased erosion occurring at Drew Point. Our results highlight an increase in erosion at Drew Point in the 21st century as well as the complexities associated with unraveling the factors responsible for changing coastal permafrost bluffs in the Arctic

Tundra fire alters vegetation patterns more than the resultant thermokarst

Tundra fires are increasing in their frequencies and intensities due to global warming, which alter revegetation patterns through various pathways. To understand the effects of tundra fire and the resultant thermokarst on revegetation, vegetation and related environmental factors were compared between burned and unburned areas of Seward Peninsula, Alaska, using a total of 140 plots, 50 cm x 50 cm each. The area was burned in 2002 and surveyed in 2013. Seven vegetation types were classified by a cluster analysis and were categorized along a fire-severity gradient from none to severe fire intensity. The species richness and diversity were higher in intermediately disturbed plots. Severe fire allowed the immigration of fire-favored species (e.g., Epilobium angustifolium, Ceratodon purpureus) and decreased or did not change the species diversity, indicating that species replacement occurred within the severely burned site. Although thermokarsts (ground subsidence) broadly occurred on burned sites, due to thawing, the subsidence weakly influenced vegetation patterns. These results suggest that the fire directly altered the species composition at a landscape scale between the burned and unburned sites and it indirectly altered the plant cover and diversity through the differential modification, such as thermokarst, at a small scale within the burned site