Dissolved organic carbon lability and stable isotope shifts during  microbial decomposition in a tropical river system

Geeraert, N.; Omengo, F. O.; Govers, G.; Bouillon, S.

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-13-517-2016

Articles | Volume 13, issue 2

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-13-517-2016

© Author(s) 2016. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-13-517-2016

© Author(s) 2016. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Articles | Volume 13, issue 2

Research article

|

26 Jan 2016

Research article |

| 26 Jan 2016

Dissolved organic carbon lability and stable isotope shifts during microbial decomposition in a tropical river system

N. Geeraert, F. O. Omengo, G. Govers, and S. Bouillon

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Final revised paper (published on 26 Jan 2016)
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Preprint (discussion started on 11 Aug 2015)
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Interactive discussion

Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

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- Supplement

RC C6668: 'Microbial degradation of riverine DOC', Anonymous Referee #1, 19 Oct 2015
- AC C8327: 'Reply to Anonymous referee #1', Naomi Geeraert, 08 Dec 2015
SC C6869: 'Dissolved organic carbon lability and stable isotope shifts during microbial decomposition in a tropical river system', Albin Nordström, 22 Oct 2015
- AC C8332: 'Reply to Albin Nordström', Naomi Geeraert, 08 Dec 2015
RC C7874: 'Review', Anonymous Referee #2, 23 Nov 2015
- AC C8341: 'Reply to Anonymous referee #2', Naomi Geeraert, 08 Dec 2015

Peer-review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

ED: Reconsider after major revisions (19 Dec 2015) by Gerhard Herndl

AR by Naomi Geeraert on behalf of the Authors (04 Jan 2016) Author's response

ED: Publish as is (14 Jan 2016) by Gerhard Herndl

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Short summary

Rivers transport a large amount of carbon as dissolved organic carbon (DOC). Our incubation experiments on water of the Tana River, Kenya, showed that microbial decomposition of 10–60 % of the initial DOC occurred within the first 24–48 h. Simultaneously, there was a decrease in isotopic composition, indicating that DOC derived from C₄ vegetation is preferentially decomposed. This has implications for the assessment of vegetation in a catchment based on isotope signatures of riverine carbon.