Soil chemical and physical data, Arctic Coastal Plain of northern Alaska, April 2018

• Main Author: Lipson, David
• Format: Dataset
• Language: English
• Published: NSF Arctic Data Center 2021
• Subjects: tundra; organic matter; soil pH; anions; extractable iron; Arctic; Tundra; Alaska
• Online Access: https://dx.doi.org/10.18739/a23b5w907; https://arcticdata.io/catalog/view/doi:10.18739/A23B5W907

This data set contains chemical and physical data for soil cores collected from eight sites across the Arctic Coastal Plain of northern Alaska in April 2018. Three replicate soils cores were collected at each site and cores were divided into 5 centimeter (cm) horizons. These data support a study of biological chlorine cycling in the Arctic and its influence on greenhouse gas production. Microbes that can decompose chlorinated organic compounds were once considered relevant only in areas contaminated with pesticides and organic solvents. However, biological chlorine cycling is proving to be widespread in natural environments. Previous studies of biological chlorine cycling were mostly limited to forested ecosystems. This project was the first to demonstrate the importance of the production and degradation of chlorinated organic compounds in Arctic soils. Furthermore, there was little information about the linkages between chlorine cycling and other important ecosystem processes, such as production of carbon dioxide and methane from soils. Species in the genus Dehalococcoides are highly specialized, using hydrogen, acetate, vitamin B12-like compounds, and organic chlorine produced by the surrounding community. We studied which neighbors might produce these essential resources for Dehalococcoides species. We found that Dehalococcoides species are ubiquitous across the Arctic Coastal Plain and are closely associated with a network of microbes that produce or consume hydrogen or acetate, including the most abundant anaerobic bacteria and methanogenic archaea. We also found organic chlorine and microbes that can produce these compounds throughout the study area. Therefore, Dehalococcoides could control the balance between carbon dioxide and methane (a more potent greenhouse gas) when suitable organic chlorine compounds are available to drive hydrogen and acetate uptake, making them unavailable for methane production.