[Influence of environmental factors on the decomposition of organic carbon in agricultural soils].

To quantitatively investigate the effects of environmental factors on organic carbon decomposition, CO2-C was measured from the incubation of wheat and rice straw as well as their roots mixed with a paddy soil over a 90-day period. Results showed that decomposition of the straw carbon was faster than that of the roots. Amount of CO2-C released from the organic matter decomposition was quantitatively related to its properties of C/N ratio. Increase of temperature within a lower temperature range enhanced greatly the decomposition while such an enhancement weakened within a higher temperature range. Under the moist condition, the temperature coefficient of organic carbon decomposition declined exponentially with the incubation time. The temperature coefficient did not significantly decrease with the time for the submerged condition after one-week incubation. The effect of water status showed that the decomposition at the water contents of 300 g.kg-1 and 500 g.kg-1 was faster than that under the treatments of 200 g.kg-1 and the submerged. Within the first month period of incubation, carbon amount released from the incubation of wheat straw was negatively related to the clay fraction of the soils.