Anthropogenic modification of phosphorus sequestration in lake sediments during the Holocene: A global perspective

Tu, Luyao, Moyle, Madeleine, Boyle, John F, Zander, Paul D, Huang, Tao, Meng, Lize, Huang, Changchun, Zhou, Xin and Grosjean, Martin (2023) Anthropogenic modification of phosphorus sequestration in lake sediments during the Holocene: A global perspective. Global and Planetary Change, 229. p. 104222.

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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gloplacha.2023.104222

Abstract

Human activity has fundamentally altered the global phosphorus (P) cycle. Yet our understanding of when and how humans influenced the P cycle has been limited by the scarcity of long-term P sequestration records, particularly outside Europe and North America. Lake sediments provide a unique archive of past P burial rates and allow the human-mediated disruption of the global P cycle to be examined. We compiled the first global-scale and continentally resolved reconstruction of lake-wide Holocene P burial rates using 108 lakes from around the world. In Europe, lake P burial rates started to increase noticeably after ∼4000 calendar years before 1950 CE (cal BP), whereas the increase occurred later in China (∼2000 cal BP) and in North America (∼550 cal BP), which is most likely related to different histories of population growth, land-use and associated soil erosion intensities. Anthropogenic soil erosion explains ∼86% of the observed changes in global lake P burial rates in pre-industrial times. We also provide the first long-term estimates of the global lake P sink over the Holocene (∼2686 Tg P). We estimate that the global mean lake sediment P sequestration since 1850 CE (100 cal BP) is ∼1.54 Tg P yr−1, representing approximately a six-fold increase above the mean pre-industrial value (∼0.24 Tg P yr−1; 11,500 to 100 cal BP) and around a ten-fold increase above the Early-Middle Holocene low-disturbance baseline of 0.16 Tg P yr−1. This study suggests that human activities have been affecting the global P cycle for millennia, with substantial alteration after industrial times (1850 CE).

Item Type:	Article
Uncontrolled Keywords:	Phosphorus, Lake sediments, Holocene, Human impacts, Land use
Divisions:	Faculty of Science and Engineering > School of Environmental Sciences
Depositing User:	Symplectic Admin
Date Deposited:	25 Sep 2023 10:16
Last Modified:	21 Oct 2023 14:25
DOI:	10.1016/j.gloplacha.2023.104222
Related URLs:	Author Publisher
URI:	https://livrepository.liverpool.ac.uk/id/eprint/3173014