Community-level respiration of prokaryotic microbes may rise with global warming.
Nat Commun
; 10(1): 5124, 2019 11 12.
Article
in En
| MEDLINE
| ID: mdl-31719536
ABSTRACT
Understanding how the metabolic rates of prokaryotes respond to temperature is fundamental to our understanding of how ecosystem functioning will be altered by climate change, as these micro-organisms are major contributors to global carbon efflux. Ecological metabolic theory suggests that species living at higher temperatures evolve higher growth rates than those in cooler niches due to thermodynamic constraints. Here, using a global prokaryotic dataset, we find that maximal growth rate at thermal optimum increases with temperature for mesophiles (temperature optima [Formula see text]C), but not thermophiles ([Formula see text]C). Furthermore, short-term (within-day) thermal responses of prokaryotic metabolic rates are typically more sensitive to warming than those of eukaryotes. Because climatic warming will mostly impact ecosystems in the mesophilic temperature range, we conclude that as microbial communities adapt to higher temperatures, their metabolic rates and therefore, biomass-specific CO[Formula see text] production, will inevitably rise. Using a mathematical model, we illustrate the potential global impacts of these findings.
Full text:
1
Collection:
01-internacional
Database:
MEDLINE
Main subject:
Prokaryotic Cells
/
Bacteria
/
Global Warming
Type of study:
Prognostic_studies
Language:
En
Journal:
Nat Commun
Journal subject:
BIOLOGIA
/
CIENCIA
Year:
2019
Document type:
Article
Affiliation country:
United kingdom