Soil Erosion Effects on Microbial Carbon Decomposition Across Three Chinese Regions

Three major water-erosion-prone regions in China—the Northeast Rolling Hills, Sichuan Basin, and Yunnan–Guizhou Plateau—accounting for about 20% of China's land area. The dataset contains soil sample data from 48 plots collected during the 2021 harvest season, analyzing microbial community structure, enzyme activities, and carbon release. It was authored by shengzhao wei and shared on figshare under a CC-BY-4.0 license.

Use Cases

• Modeling erosion-induced carbon flux based on cumulative CO₂-C release data from a 308-day incubation.
• Analyzing shifts in microbial functional profiles based on carbon degradation gene data (e.g., mnp, lig).
• Studying the relationship between geomorphic position and soil organic carbon fractions across an erosion-deposition sequence.
• Investigating links between extracellular enzyme activities (oxidative and hydrolytic) and aggregate stability in eroded soils.

Strengths

• Samples from 48 plots across three distinct geographic regions, providing spatial replication.
• Includes a 308-day laboratory incubation quantifying cumulative CO₂-C release.
• Multiple analytical layers per sample: microbial community structure, functional genes, enzyme activities, and soil physicochemical properties.
• Erosion classes were quantitatively validated using A-horizon thickness relative to reference soils.

Limitations

• Row count is unknown, which may limit suitability assessment.
• Column-level documentation is absent; field semantics must be inferred after download.
• Data is from a single harvest season (September–November 2021), limiting temporal scope.

Provenance

Source

figshare, author shengzhao wei.

Collection Method

Soil samples collected from intensively managed sloping farmlands, composited and homogenized, followed by laboratory analyses and incubation.

Time Range

2021 harvest season (September–November).

Freshness

Last updated 2026-05-16 16:06:58; freshness should be verified.

Geography

Three water-erosion-prone regions in China: Northeast Rolling Hills, Sichuan Basin, and Yunnan–Guizhou Plateau.