Abstract
Microbial nitrate reduction in wetland soils and sediments plays an important role mitigating the excess of nitrogen released into the environment. The reduction of nitrate to its reduced gaseous form, i.e. denitrification, is tightly linked to the oxidation of organic carbon. In intertidal wetlands, the organic carbon derived from aquatic or terrestrial primary producers strongly differs in composition, which in turn might affect nitrate reduction rates. In the current study the impact of carbon quality on benthic nitrate reduction in a temperate intertidal wetland sediment was determined. To this end, nitrate reduction rates were determined over a three-week period using an anoxic controlled flow-through reactor approach using sediments amended with carbon from different vegetation types. Organic carbon from algal or plants was mixed with the sediment at the same absolute quantity of carbon. A significant initial increase in nitrate reduction rates was observed in the presence of algal (microphytobenthos) derived organic carbon, most likely due to its labile structure; however, rates decreased rapidly, most likely due to a depletion of the labile source. This indicates the dependence of denitrifiers to the microalgae turnover in non-vegetated sediment. Despite a delay, the addition of plant derived organic carbon, increased nitrate reduction rates with a higher amount of total nitrate reduced over the duration of experiment compared to the microphytobenthos addition. These results highlight that presence of both labile and recalcitrant carbon sources in sediment is essential to support an efficient nitrogen biogeochemical cycle.
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the GIP Seine-Aval project “FEREE” (Program SA6) and the CESAM (UIDP/50017/2020 + UIDB/50017/2020 + LA/P/0094/2020). The authors acknowledge Estelle Langlois (PI of the project), Samuel Hermant for its implication in this experimental study, as well as Garance Regimbeau, Guillaume Bouger, and Sarah Coffinet for their help during sampling. The ECOCHIM platform of Rennes University is acknowledged for help with the Gallery device. The authors finally acknowledge the anonymous reviewers that significantly helped to improve the manuscript.
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This work was funded by the GIP Seine-Aval through the SA6 – FEREE project (https://www.seine37aval.fr/projet/feree/) and supported by the CESAM (UIDP/50017/2020 + UIDB/50017/2020 + LA/P/0094/2020).
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JM performed conception and design of this study, material preparation, sample collection, analyzes, interpretation of data, and wrote the first draft of the manuscript. LJ performed analyzes, interpretation of data, and contributed to the manuscript. AML performed conception and design of this study, material preparation, analysis, interpretation of data and contributed to the manuscript. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.
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Morelle, J., Jeanneau, L. & Laverman, A.M. Organic Carbon Quality Impacts Benthic Microbial Nitrate Reduction. Wetlands 43, 99 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s13157-023-01747-7
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s13157-023-01747-7