Soil carbon controlled by plant, microorganism and mineralogy interactions

Rhizosphere, a thin area of soil surrounding roots receiving carbon (C) exudation from plants, represents a site of intense competition for available C and nutrient between surface-reactive particles and soil microorganisms. This competition can reduce the amount of available C to a critical level, it becomes limiting for microbial growth and soil organic matter decomposition. On the other hand, acceleration or retardation of decomposition of soil organic C caused by root activity is termed rhizosphere priming effect (RPE). This effect has been increasingly recognized to play a crucial role on native C destabilization as is influenced by fresh C availability, microbial activity and soil mineralogy such as crystallinity of clay minerals and Al-, Fe-oxides. Combining microbial ecology and soil mineral interactions, we can understand how soil characteristics and climate change can influence below ground competition and finally RPE. In this review, we focus on the competition for available C in soil, limiting our analyses to the interaction at rhizospheric space, where most processes between microorganisms and mineral phase occurs.