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Scaling metabolism from organisms to ecosystems

Nature volume 423, pages 639–642 (2003)Cite this article

Abstract

Understanding energy and material fluxes through ecosystems is central to many questions in global change biology and ecology1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11. Ecosystem respiration is a critical component of the carbon cycle1,5,6,7 and might be important in regulating biosphere response to global climate change1,2,3. Here we derive a general model of ecosystem respiration based on the kinetics of metabolic reactions11,12,13 and the scaling of resource use by individual organisms14,15. The model predicts that fluxes of CO2 and energy are invariant of ecosystem biomass, but are strongly influenced by temperature, variation in cellular metabolism and rates of supply of limiting resources (water and/or nutrients). Variation in ecosystem respiration within sites, as calculated from a network of CO2 flux towers5,7, provides robust support for the model's predictions. However, data indicate that variation in annual flux between sites is not strongly dependent on average site temperature or latitude. This presents an interesting paradox with regard to the expected temperature dependence. Nevertheless, our model provides a basis for quantitatively understanding energy and material flux between the atmosphere and biosphere.

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Figure 1: A plot of night-time ecosystem flux, ln(Be), against the reciprocal of absolute temperature for 30-min average samples throughout the year for six representative eddy covariance flux-tower sites.
Figure 2: Summary of variability in the temperature and flux function across sites.
Figure 3: Relationship between the annual night-time CO2 flux (average rate per second) and the average annual night-time temperature for both North American (open symbols) and European sites (solid symbols).

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Acknowledgements

We thank D. Baldocchi for assistance with accessing FLUXNET data; the contributors of FLUXNET for their support of this project; and M. Weiser, D. Kerkhoff, N. Phillips, J. Harte, K. J. Niklas, S. Cowling, J. Williams and J. H. Brown for providing assistance and/or comments on earlier drafts. B.J.E. was supported by an NSF CAREER fellowship and a Center for Applied Biodiversity, Conservation International Fellowship, a LANL grant, and the University of Arizona. T.E.H. was supported by an award from IALC and the University of Arizona. B.J.E. and T.E.H. acknowledge support from the Institute for the Study of Planet Earth at the University of Arizona. J.F.G. acknowledges support from the Thaw Charitable Trust and the Packard Foundation. A.P.A. acknowledges support from NSF.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona, 85721, USA

    Brian J. Enquist, Evan P. Economo, Travis E. Huxman & Danielle D. Ignace

  2. Center for Applied Biodiversity Science, 1919 M. Street, NW, Suite 600, Washington DC, 20036, USA

    Brian J. Enquist

  3. Department of Biology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico, 87131, USA

    Andrew P. Allen & James F. Gillooly

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  1. Brian J. Enquist
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Correspondence to Brian J. Enquist.

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Enquist, B., Economo, E., Huxman, T. et al. Scaling metabolism from organisms to ecosystems. Nature 423, 639–642 (2003). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature01671

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