Giardina, C. P., Litton, C. M., Crow, S. E. & Asner, G. P. Warming-related increases in soil CO2 efflux are explained by increased below-ground carbon flux. Nat. Clim. Change 4, 822–827 (2014).
Morra, B. M., Richardson, W. C., Stringham, T. K. & Sullivan, B. W. Carbon stocks and total belowground carbon flux respond to weather and grazing in semiarid montane meadows. Ecosystems 26, 1428–1440 (2023).
Giardina, C. P., Binkley, D., Ryan, M. G., Fownes, J. H. & Senock, R. S. Belowground carbon cycling in a humid tropical forest decreases with fertilization. Oecologia 139, 545–550 (2004).
Giardina, C. P. et al. in Trees Species Effects on Soils: Implications for Global Change (eds Binkley, D. & Menyailo, O.) 119–154 (Springer, 2005).
Drake, J. E. et al. Increases in the flux of carbon belowground stimulate nitrogen uptake and sustain the long-term enhancement of forest productivity under elevated CO2. Ecol. Lett. 14, 349–357 (2011).
Gill, A. L. & Finzi, A. C. Belowground carbon flux links biogeochemical cycles and resource-use efficiency at the global scale. Ecol. Lett. 19, 1419–1428 (2016).
Keller, A. & Phillips, R. P. Relationship between belowground carbon allocation and nitrogen uptake in saplings varies by plant mycorrhizal type. Front. For. Glob. Change 2, 81 (2019).
IPCC Climate Change 2023: Synthesis Report (eds Lee, H. & Romero, J.) (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2023).
Reich, P. B. et al. Synergistic effects of four climate change drivers on terrestrial carbon cycling. Nat. Geosci. 13, 787–793 (2020).
Song, J. et al. A meta-analysis of 1,119 manipulative experiments on terrestrial carbon-cycling responses to global change. Nat. Ecol. Evol. 3, 1309–1320 (2019).
Reich, P. B. et al. Nitrogen limitation constrains sustainability of ecosystem response to CO2. Nature 440, 922–925 (2006).
Pastore, M. A., Lee, T. D., Hobbie, S. E. & Reich, P. B. Interactive effects of elevated CO, warming, reduced rainfall, and nitrogen on leaf gas exchange in five perennial grassland species. Plant Cell Environ. 43, 1862–1878 (2020).
Rillig, M. C. et al. The role of multiple global change factors in driving soil functions and microbial biodiversity. Science 366, 886–890 (2019).
Mueller, K. E. et al. Impacts of warming and elevated CO2 on a semi-arid grassland are non-additive, shift with precipitation, and reverse over time. Ecol. Lett. 19, 956–966 (2016).
Zhou, L. et al. Responses of biomass allocation to multi-factor global change: a global synthesis. Agric. Ecosyst. Environ. 304, 107115 (2020).
Giardina, C. P. & Ryan, M. G. Total belowground carbon allocation in a fast-growing Eucalyptus plantation estimated using a carbon balance approach. Ecosystems 5, 487–499 (2002).
Harrison, S. P. et al. Eco-evolutionary optimality as a means to improve vegetation and land-surface models. New Phytol. 231, 2125–2141 (2021).
Carol Adair, E., Reich, P. B., Hobbie, S. E. & Knops, J. M. H. Interactive effects of time, CO2, N, and diversity on total belowground carbon allocation and ecosystem carbon storage in a grassland community. Ecosystems 12, 1037–1052 (2009).
Zeng, W., Zhang, J., Dong, L., Wang, W. & Zeng, H. Nonlinear responses of total belowground carbon flux and its components to increased nitrogen availability in temperate forests. Sci. Total Environ. 715, 136954 (2020).
Gherardi, L. A. & Sala, O. E. Global patterns and climatic controls of belowground net carbon fixation. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 117, 20038–20043 (2020).
Li, F. et al. Trade-off in the partitioning of recent photosynthate carbon under global change. Glob. Change Biol. 30, e17110 (2024).
Eastman, B. A. et al. Altered plant carbon partitioning enhanced forest ecosystem carbon storage after 25 years of nitrogen additions. New Phytol. 230, 1435–1448 (2021).
Giardina, C. P., Ryan, M. G., Binkley, D. & Fownes, J. H. Primary production and carbon allocation in relation to nutrient supply in a tropical experimental forest. Glob. Change Biol. 9, 1438–1450 (2003).
Lyu, M., Giardina, C. P. & Litton, C. M. Interannual variation in rainfall modulates temperature sensitivity of carbon allocation and flux in a tropical montane wet forest. Glob. Change Biol. 27, 3824–3836 (2021).
Andresen, L. C. et al. in Advances in Ecological Research Vol. 55 (eds Dumbrell, A. J. et al.) 437–473 (Academic, 2016).
Reich, P. B. & Hobbie, S. E. Decade-long soil nitrogen constraint on the CO2 fertilization of plant biomass. Nat. Clim. Change 3, 278–282 (2013).
Van Sundert, K. et al. When things get MESI: The Manipulation Experiments Synthesis Initiative—a coordinated effort to synthesize terrestrial global change experiments. Glob. Change Biol. 29, 1922–1938 (2023).
Schindlbacher, A. et al. Soil respiration under climate change: prolonged summer drought offsets soil warming effects. Glob. Change Biol. 18, 2270–2279 (2012).
Liang, G. et al. Soil respiration response to decade-long warming modulated by soil moisture in a boreal forest. Nat. Geosci. 17, 905–911 (2024).
Wan, S., Norby, R. J., Ledford, J. & Weltzin, J. F. Responses of soil respiration to elevated CO2, air warming, and changing soil water availability in a model old-field grassland. Glob. Change Biol. 13, 2411–2424 (2007).
de Vries, F. T. et al. Changes in root-exudate-induced respiration reveal a novel mechanism through which drought affects ecosystem carbon cycling. New Phytol. 224, 132–145 (2019).
Karlowsky, S. et al. Land use in mountain grasslands alters drought response and recovery of carbon allocation and plant-microbial interactions. J. Ecol. 106, 1230–1243 (2018).
Du, Y., Wang, Y.-P., Hui, D., Su, F. & Yan, J. Significant effects of precipitation frequency on soil respiration and its components—a global synthesis. Glob. Change Biol. 29, 1188–1205 (2023).
Ford, C. R., McGee, J., Scandellari, F., Hobbie, E. A. & Mitchell, R. J. Long- and short-term precipitation effects on soil CO2 efflux and total belowground carbon allocation. Agric. For. Meteorol. 156, 54–64 (2012).
Litton, C. M., Raich, J. W. & Ryan, M. G. Carbon allocation in forest ecosystems. Glob. Change Biol. 13, 2089–2109 (2007).
Reich, P. B., Hobbie, S. E. & Lee, T. D. Plant growth enhancement by elevated CO2 eliminated by joint water and nitrogen limitation. Nat. Geosci. 7, 920–924 (2014).
Tang, X. et al. Global patterns of soil autotrophic respiration and its relation to climate, soil and vegetation characteristics. Geoderma 369, 114339 (2020).
Schindlbacher, A. et al. Increased belowground carbon allocation reduces soil carbon losses under long-term warming. Glob. Change Biol. 31, e70561 (2025).
Dijkstra, F. A., Zhu, B. & Cheng, W. Root effects on soil organic carbon: a double-edged sword. New Phytol. 230, 60–65 (2021).
Schmidt, E. L. in Nitrogen in Agricultural Soils (ed. Stevenson, F. J.) 253–288 (American Society of Agronomy, 1982).
Dijkstra, F. A., West, J. B., Hobbie, S. E., Reich, P. B. & Trost, J. Plant diversity, CO2, and N influence inorganic and organic N leaching in grasslands. Ecology 88, 490–500 (2007).
Kishimoto-Mo, A. W. et al. Contribution of soil moisture to seasonal and annual variations of soil CO2 efflux in a humid cool-temperate oak-birch forest in central Japan. Ecol. Res. 30, 311–325 (2015).
Laliberte, E. & Legendre, P. A distance-based framework for measuring functional diversity from multiple traits. Ecology 91, 299–305 (2010).
Bates, D. et al. lme4: linear mixed-effects models using Eigen and S4. R version 1.1-13 https://cran.r-project.org/web/packages/lme4/index.html (2017).
Long, J. A. interactions: comprehensive, user-friendly toolkit for probing interactions. R version 1.2.0 https://cran.r-project.org/package=interactions (2019).
Adams, D. C., Gurevitch, J. & Rosenberg, M. S. Resampling tests for meta-analysis of ecological data. Ecology 78, 1277–1283 (1997).
R Core Team. R: A Language and Environment for Statistical Computing (R Foundation for Statistical Computing, 2020).
Chen, X. Data and R codes for ‘Long-term multiple global change interactions amplify belowground carbon allocation’. figshare https://doi.org/10.6084/m9.figshare.31321399 (2026).
