Nitrogen addition increased soil particulate organic carbon via plant carbon input whereas reduced mineral-associated organic carbon through attenuating mineral protection in agroecosystem.

Nitrogen (N) addition can have substantial impacts on both aboveground and belowground processes such as plant productivity, microbial activity, and soil properties, which in turn alters the fate of soil organic carbon (SOC). However, how N addition affects various SOC fractions such as particulate organic carbon (POC) and mineral-associated organic carbon (MAOC), particularly in agroecosystem, and the underlying mechanisms remain unclear. In this study, plant biomass (grain yield, straw biomass, and root biomass), soil chemical properties (pH, N availability, exchangeable cations and amorphous Al/Fe - (hydr) oxides) and microbial characteristics (biomass and functional genes) in response to a N addition experiment (0, 150, 225, 300, and 375 kg ha) in paddy soil were investigated to explore the predominant controls of POC and MAOC. Our results showed that POC significantly increased, while MAOC decreased under N addition (p < 0.05). Correlation analysis and PLSPM results suggested that increased C input, as indicated by root biomass, predominated the increase in POC. The declined MAOC was not mainly dominated by microbial control, but was strongly associated with the attenuated mineral protection (especially Ca) induced by soil acidification under N addition. Collectively, our results emphasized the importance of combining C input and soil chemistry in predicting soil C dynamics and thereby determining soil organic C storage in response to N addition in rice agroecosystem.