Animals & nature · 2024
Where does the carbon Arctic plants take in beneath the snow go?
It goes preferentially into sugars and starch rather than fats. In all five tundra plant species tested before snowmelt, researchers found stronger labeling of sugars and starch with newly acquired carbon than of fats. This supports the idea that plants replenish substances used during winter, but does not establish how widespread this pattern is among Arctic plants.
Details
Some Arctic evergreen and semi-evergreen plants can photosynthesize beneath the snow in spring, using light to take in carbon from carbon dioxide. Researchers supplied tundra plants with carbon dioxide carrying a traceable carbon label before the snow melted, then examined where that label appeared.
Across all five species tested, soluble sugars and starch were preferentially labeled, while fats showed comparatively little labeling. The researchers interpret this as evidence that plants begin replenishing substances used over the long winter while they are still beneath snow.
The newly made sugars might also help protect plants from light damage and cold as they emerge from snow, but those functions were proposed rather than demonstrated by the reported tracing results. The authors also suggest that a shorter period of photosynthesis beneath snow under climate change could limit this replenishment and affect plant competition. Those longer-term consequences were not established by this experiment.
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