Desert breath—How fog promotes a novel type of soil biocenosis, forming the coastal Atacama Desert’s living skin
The Atacama Desert is the driest non‐polar desert on Earth, presenting precarious conditions for biological activity. In the arid coastal belt, life is restricted to areas with fog events that cause almost daily wet–dry cycles. In such an area, we discov‐ered a hitherto unknown and unique ground cov...
Published in: | Geobiology |
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Online Access: | https://kluedo.ub.rptu.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/7955 https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:hbz:386-kluedo-79550 https://doi.org/10.1111/gbi.12368 https://kluedo.ub.rptu.de/files/7955/Patrick%20Jung%20GB%2010.1111gbi.12368.pdf |
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ftunivkaisers:oai:kluedo.ub.rptu.de:7955 2024-04-28T08:36:37+00:00 Desert breath—How fog promotes a novel type of soil biocenosis, forming the coastal Atacama Desert’s living skin Jung, Patrick Baumann, Karen Lehnwert, Lukas W. Samolov, Elena Achilles, Sebastian Schermer, Michael Wraase, Luise M. Eckhardt, Kai-Uwe Bader, Maaike Y. Leinweber, Peter Karsten, Ulf Bendix, Jörg Büdel, Burkhard 2019 application/pdf https://kluedo.ub.rptu.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/7955 https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:hbz:386-kluedo-79550 https://doi.org/10.1111/gbi.12368 https://kluedo.ub.rptu.de/files/7955/Patrick%20Jung%20GB%2010.1111gbi.12368.pdf eng eng https://kluedo.ub.rptu.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/7955 urn:nbn:de:hbz:386-kluedo-79550 https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:hbz:386-kluedo-79550 https://doi.org/10.1111/gbi.12368 https://kluedo.ub.rptu.de/files/7955/Patrick%20Jung%20GB%2010.1111gbi.12368.pdf Zweitveröffentlichung http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/urhg/__38.html info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess ddc:570 article doc-type:article 2019 ftunivkaisers https://doi.org/10.1111/gbi.12368 2024-04-09T23:32:46Z The Atacama Desert is the driest non‐polar desert on Earth, presenting precarious conditions for biological activity. In the arid coastal belt, life is restricted to areas with fog events that cause almost daily wet–dry cycles. In such an area, we discov‐ered a hitherto unknown and unique ground covering biocenosis dominated by li‐chens, fungi, and algae attached to grit‐sized (~6 mm) quartz and granitoid stones. Comparable biocenosis forming a kind of a layer on top of soil and rock surfaces in general is summarized as cryptogamic ground covers (CGC) in literature. In contrast to known CGC from arid environments to which frequent cyclic wetting events are lethal, in the Atacama Desert every fog event is answered by photosynthetic activity of the soil community and thus considered as the desert's breath. Photosynthesis of the new CGC type is activated by the lowest amount of water known for such a community worldwide thus enabling the unique biocenosis to fulfill a variety of eco‐system services. In a considerable portion of the coastal Atacama Desert, it protects the soil from sporadically occurring splash erosion and contributes to the accumula‐tion of soil carbon and nitrogen as well as soil formation through bio‐weathering. The structure and function of the new CGC type are discussed, and we suggest the name grit–crust. We conclude that this type of CGC can be expected in all non‐polar fog deserts of the world and may resemble the cryptogam communities that shaped ancient Earth. It may thus represent a relevant player in current and ancient biogeo‐chemical cycling. Article in Journal/Newspaper polar desert KLUEDO - Publication Server of University of Kaiserslautern-Landau (RPTU) Geobiology 18 1 113 124 |
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KLUEDO - Publication Server of University of Kaiserslautern-Landau (RPTU) |
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ftunivkaisers |
language |
English |
topic |
ddc:570 |
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ddc:570 Jung, Patrick Baumann, Karen Lehnwert, Lukas W. Samolov, Elena Achilles, Sebastian Schermer, Michael Wraase, Luise M. Eckhardt, Kai-Uwe Bader, Maaike Y. Leinweber, Peter Karsten, Ulf Bendix, Jörg Büdel, Burkhard Desert breath—How fog promotes a novel type of soil biocenosis, forming the coastal Atacama Desert’s living skin |
topic_facet |
ddc:570 |
description |
The Atacama Desert is the driest non‐polar desert on Earth, presenting precarious conditions for biological activity. In the arid coastal belt, life is restricted to areas with fog events that cause almost daily wet–dry cycles. In such an area, we discov‐ered a hitherto unknown and unique ground covering biocenosis dominated by li‐chens, fungi, and algae attached to grit‐sized (~6 mm) quartz and granitoid stones. Comparable biocenosis forming a kind of a layer on top of soil and rock surfaces in general is summarized as cryptogamic ground covers (CGC) in literature. In contrast to known CGC from arid environments to which frequent cyclic wetting events are lethal, in the Atacama Desert every fog event is answered by photosynthetic activity of the soil community and thus considered as the desert's breath. Photosynthesis of the new CGC type is activated by the lowest amount of water known for such a community worldwide thus enabling the unique biocenosis to fulfill a variety of eco‐system services. In a considerable portion of the coastal Atacama Desert, it protects the soil from sporadically occurring splash erosion and contributes to the accumula‐tion of soil carbon and nitrogen as well as soil formation through bio‐weathering. The structure and function of the new CGC type are discussed, and we suggest the name grit–crust. We conclude that this type of CGC can be expected in all non‐polar fog deserts of the world and may resemble the cryptogam communities that shaped ancient Earth. It may thus represent a relevant player in current and ancient biogeo‐chemical cycling. |
format |
Article in Journal/Newspaper |
author |
Jung, Patrick Baumann, Karen Lehnwert, Lukas W. Samolov, Elena Achilles, Sebastian Schermer, Michael Wraase, Luise M. Eckhardt, Kai-Uwe Bader, Maaike Y. Leinweber, Peter Karsten, Ulf Bendix, Jörg Büdel, Burkhard |
author_facet |
Jung, Patrick Baumann, Karen Lehnwert, Lukas W. Samolov, Elena Achilles, Sebastian Schermer, Michael Wraase, Luise M. Eckhardt, Kai-Uwe Bader, Maaike Y. Leinweber, Peter Karsten, Ulf Bendix, Jörg Büdel, Burkhard |
author_sort |
Jung, Patrick |
title |
Desert breath—How fog promotes a novel type of soil biocenosis, forming the coastal Atacama Desert’s living skin |
title_short |
Desert breath—How fog promotes a novel type of soil biocenosis, forming the coastal Atacama Desert’s living skin |
title_full |
Desert breath—How fog promotes a novel type of soil biocenosis, forming the coastal Atacama Desert’s living skin |
title_fullStr |
Desert breath—How fog promotes a novel type of soil biocenosis, forming the coastal Atacama Desert’s living skin |
title_full_unstemmed |
Desert breath—How fog promotes a novel type of soil biocenosis, forming the coastal Atacama Desert’s living skin |
title_sort |
desert breath—how fog promotes a novel type of soil biocenosis, forming the coastal atacama desert’s living skin |
publishDate |
2019 |
url |
https://kluedo.ub.rptu.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/7955 https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:hbz:386-kluedo-79550 https://doi.org/10.1111/gbi.12368 https://kluedo.ub.rptu.de/files/7955/Patrick%20Jung%20GB%2010.1111gbi.12368.pdf |
genre |
polar desert |
genre_facet |
polar desert |
op_relation |
https://kluedo.ub.rptu.de/frontdoor/index/index/docId/7955 urn:nbn:de:hbz:386-kluedo-79550 https://nbn-resolving.org/urn:nbn:de:hbz:386-kluedo-79550 https://doi.org/10.1111/gbi.12368 https://kluedo.ub.rptu.de/files/7955/Patrick%20Jung%20GB%2010.1111gbi.12368.pdf |
op_rights |
Zweitveröffentlichung http://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/urhg/__38.html info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
op_doi |
https://doi.org/10.1111/gbi.12368 |
container_title |
Geobiology |
container_volume |
18 |
container_issue |
1 |
container_start_page |
113 |
op_container_end_page |
124 |
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1797568335411412992 |