Elevated CO and plant nitrogen-use: is reduced tissue nitrogen concentration size-dependent?

Plants often respond to elevated atmospheric CO levels with reduced tissue nitrogen concentrations relative to ambient CO-grown plants when comparisons are made at a common time. Another common response to enriched CO atmospheres is an acceleration in plant growth rates. Because plant nitrogen concentrations are often highest in seedlings and subsequently decrease during growth, comparisons between ambient and elevated CO-grown plants made at a common time may not demonstrate CO-induced reductions in plant nitrogen concentration per se. Rather, this comparison may be highlighting differences in nitrogen concentration between bigger, more developed plants and smaller, less developed plants. In this study, we directly examined whether elevated CO environments reduce plant nitrogen concentrations independent of changes in plant growth rates. We grew two annual plant species. Abutilon theophrasti (C photosynthetic pathway) and Amaranthus retroflexus (C photosynthetic pathway), from seed in glass-sided growth chambers with atmospheric CO levels of 350 μmol·mol or 700 μmol·mol and with high or low fertilizer applications. Individual plants were harvested every 2 days starting 3 days after germination to determine plant biomass and nitrogen concentration. We found: 1. High CO-grown plants had reduced nitrogen concentrations and increased biomass relative to ambient CO-grown plants when compared at a common time; 2. Tissue nitrogen concentrations did not vary as a function of CO level when plants were compared at a common size; and 3. The rate of biomass accumulation per rate of increase in plant nitrogen was unaffected by CO availability, but was altered by nutrient availability. These results indicate that a CO-induced reduction in plant nitrogen concentration may not be due to physiological changes in plant nitrogen use efficiency, but is probably a size-dependent phenomenon resulting from accelerated plant growth.