Role of Iron Oxyhydrates in Accumulation and Stabilization of Soil Organic Matter in Rice Paddy: Case Studies from China

Abstract:

Iron is an important element in soils, often in forms either of crystalline mineral or amorphous colloids upon redox cycling in hydromorphic soils. However, role of iron particularly via oxyhydrates in organic matter dynamics n rice soils has been not yet well assessed. Rice paddy soils of China have been recognized as a unique type of Anthrosols mostly with iron accumulation and dynamic movement in soil profile through long term hydroagric management. Soil organic matter contents of rice soils are shown significantly correlated with the contents of free or amorphous iron oxyhydrates. And organic matter accumulation in young rice soils followed iron oxyhydrate content changes as rice cultivation proceed, which could be often traced by the changes in iron oxyhydrate-bound OC fractions. The importance of association of OC with iron oxyhydrates is known by the fact that organic carbon was not related to total free iron oxyhydrates in wetland but in rice soil shifted from the wetlands, with OC contents much higher in rice soils than in the precedent wetland soil. This could be attributed to the chemical binding of OC to oxyhydrate surface, contributing to the stabilization of newly sequestered OC. This has been again confirmed by lab incubation studies, where total mineralization of OC has been found significantly lower in iron-oxyhrate rich soil than in iron-oxyhrate poor soils. This effect has been further explored in an incubation study with experimental warming that the temperature dependence of OC mineralization of rice soils from a long term fertilizer treated trial was linked to the abundance of iron oxyhydrate content, varying with the long term management practice. Initial carbon sequestration in rice soil subject to new carbon input was promoted by the iron oxyhydrates in the soil, showing a fast increase in iron hydrate-bound OC in the initial stage. The bound OC exerted further stabilization through enhanced humification to form residual OC fraction in long term, which was demonstrated with the molecular changes in iron oxyhydrate bound fraction of OC in the final stage of incubation. Therefore, iron cycling through dynamic changes with redox fluctuations could be closely linked to C cycling in rice sols, of which the processes and the associated mineral-OC-microbial interactions have been poorly understood.