Rapid microbial production of long-lived dissolved organic carbon in the global ocean

Marine microbes have long been regarded as central to replenishing the ocean's reservoir of recalcitrant dissolved organic matter (RDOM). However, molecular-level evidence for their role remains inconclusive because RDOM persists for years to millennia, far exceeding timescales accessible to laboratory experiments, and because conventional analytical approaches lack the resolution to discern structural isomers of RDOM that confer functionally important differences in persistence. Using polarity-based liquid chromatography coupled to ultrahigh-resolution mass spectrometry capable of discriminating RDOM isomer clusters, we reveal that marine microbial consortia rapidly (≤ 90 d) convert diverse organic substrates into RDOM with extensive structural isomerism that closely mirrors natural seawater RDOM. A subset of these microbially derived RDOM compounds exhibits near-ubiquitous occurrence (> 99%) in a global dataset and accumulates progressively in the ocean's interior. Together, our findings substantiate the direct microbial contribution to the long-lived oceanic carbon reservoir through the rapid diversification of RDOM isomers, a mechanism that contributes to sustaining the complexity and long-term persistence of the planetary-scale carbon reservoir.

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Publication Details

Journal
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Published
2026-07-27
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2601044123
Primary Topic
Marine and coastal ecosystems
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
0.00

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article

Rapid microbial production of long-lived dissolved organic carbon in the global ocean

Ding He, Helena Osterholz, Andrew J. Tanentzap, Oliver Jens Lechtenfeld et al.
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
Marine and coastal ecosystems
article

Rapid microbial production of long-lived dissolved organic carbon in the global ocean

Ding He, Helena Osterholz, Andrew J. Tanentzap, Oliver Jens Lechtenfeld, Gerhard J. Herndl, Yuanbi Yi, Ruanhong Cai, Julian P. Sachs, Boris Koch, Chuanlun Zhang, Chen Zhao, Zhenwei Yan, Shuh‐Ji Kao, Penghui Li, Nianzhi Jiao
article en

Abstract

Marine microbes have long been regarded as central to replenishing the ocean's reservoir of recalcitrant dissolved organic matter (RDOM). However, molecular-level evidence for their role remains inconclusive because RDOM persists for years to millennia, far exceeding timescales accessible to laboratory experiments, and because conventional analytical approaches lack the resolution to discern structural isomers of RDOM that confer functionally important differences in persistence. Using polarity-based liquid chromatography coupled to ultrahigh-resolution mass spectrometry capable of discriminating RDOM isomer clusters, we reveal that marine microbial consortia rapidly (≤ 90 d) convert diverse organic substrates into RDOM with extensive structural isomerism that closely mirrors natural seawater RDOM. A subset of these microbially derived RDOM compounds exhibits near-ubiquitous occurrence (> 99%) in a global dataset and accumulates progressively in the ocean's interior. Together, our findings substantiate the direct microbial contribution to the long-lived oceanic carbon reservoir through the rapid diversification of RDOM isomers, a mechanism that contributes to sustaining the complexity and long-term persistence of the planetary-scale carbon reservoir.

Proceedings of the National Academy of SciencesVol. 123(31)
Alfred-Wegener-Institut Helmholtz-Zentrum für Polar- und Meeresforschung (DE), University of Vienna (AT), Carl von Ossietzky Universität Oldenburg (DE), Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (DE), City University of Hong Kong (HK), University of Applied Science and Technology (IR), University of Washington (US), Hainan University (CN), Ocean Park Conservation Foundation (HK), Leibniz Institute for Baltic Sea Research Warnemünde (DE), Southern University of Science and Technology (CN), Southern Marine Science and Engineering Guangdong Laboratory (Guangzhou) (CN), Royal Netherlands Institute for Sea Research (NL), OceanX Technology (China) (CN), Center for Climate and Resilience Research (CL), Nano Carbon (Poland) (PL), Trent University (CA), University of Hong Kong (HK)
National Natural Science Foundation of China
Life below water
Openalex Percentile: Top 11%
Marine and coastal ecosystems
DOIOpen Access PDFOpenAlex
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