Wetlands are the largest and increasing natural source of methane. Peatlands are wetlands with a thick layer of peat and often a high cover of plants with aerenchyma, an adaptation to transport oxygen for the roots under water. The same tissue transports methane into the atmosphere. Plants also provide substrate for methane production. Peatland methane cycling depends on plants, but the exact plant traits are not well known. Peatland vegetation is changing because of the altered climate and land use, making it important to understand how these changes affect methane cycling. This project will quantify oxygen and methane transport and substrate provisioning by aerenchymous plants and the traits related to these processes. We quantify, how the traits vary between species, environmental conditions and land uses and how well they explain ecosystem scale methane release. This data will be combined with information about plant and microbial community and methane production and oxidation.

2025

2029