Mycorrhizal Mediation of Soil (eBook)

Mycorrhizal Mediation of Soil: Fertility, Structure, and Carbon Storage offers a better understanding of mycorrhizal mediation that will help inform earth system models and subsequently improve the accuracy of global carbon model predictions. Mycorrhizas transport tremendous quantities of plant-derived carbon below ground and are increasingly recognized for their importance in the creation, structure, and function of soils. Different global carbon models vary widely in their predictions of the dynamics of the terrestrial carbon pool, ranging from a large sink to a large source. This edited book presents a unique synthesis of the influence of environmental change on mycorrhizas across a wide range of ecosystems, as well as a clear examination of new discoveries and challenges for the future, to inform land management practices that preserve or increase below ground carbon storage. - Synthesizes the abundance of research on the influence of environmental change on mycorrhizas across a wide range of ecosystems from a variety of leading international researchers - Focuses on the specific role of mycorrhizal fungi in soil processes, with an emphasis on soil development and carbon storage, including coverage of cutting-edge methods and perspectives - Includes a chapter in each section on future avenues for further study

Nancy Collins Johnson has been a professor of soil ecology at Northern Arizona University since 1997. She earned a PhD in Ecology and Plant Pathology from the University of Minnesota (with David Tilman) and a MS degree in Botany from the University of Wisconsin. Johnson and her students study interactions among communities of plants and soil organisms in natural and human managed ecosystems throughout the world. They have discovered that mycorrhizas and soil communities are sensitive to global change factors and they are seeking first principles to understand these responses. These studies are important because mycorrhizal symbioses influence plant community composition, soil stability, and belowground carbon storage.

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Mycorrhizal Mediation of Soil: Fertility, Structure, and Carbon Storage offers a better understanding of mycorrhizal mediation that will help inform earth system models and subsequently improve the accuracy of global carbon model predictions. Mycorrhizas transport tremendous quantities of plant-derived carbon below ground and are increasingly recognized for their importance in the creation, structure, and function of soils. Different global carbon models vary widely in their predictions of the dynamics of the terrestrial carbon pool, ranging from a large sink to a large source. This edited book presents a unique synthesis of the influence of environmental change on mycorrhizas across a wide range of ecosystems, as well as a clear examination of new discoveries and challenges for the future, to inform land management practices that preserve or increase below ground carbon storage. - Synthesizes the abundance of research on the influence of environmental change on mycorrhizas across a wide range of ecosystems from a variety of leading international researchers- Focuses on the specific role of mycorrhizal fungi in soil processes, with an emphasis on soil development and carbon storage, including coverage of cutting-edge methods and perspectives- Includes a chapter in each section on future avenues for further study