New paper in L&O: Nitrifiers and the carbon cycle

A new paper led by postdoctoral researcher Barbara Bayer shows that nitrifying archaea and bacteria impact the ocean's carbon cycle in addition to their well-known role in the nitrogen cycle. She carefully investigated ten different strains of ammonia-oxidizing archaea and nitrite-oxidizing bacteria to determine how much carbon they can fix for every mole of nitrogen they oxidize. She also found that they release 5-15% of the carbon they fix as dissolved organic carbon into the surround seawater, where it can become food for other microbes.