Contribution of oxic methane production to surface methane emission in lakes and its global importance.
Where this comes from
- Record sourced from PubMed, PMID 31792203.
- Also identified by DOI 10.1038/s41467-019-13320-0 and PMC identifier 6888895.
- Licence recorded as CC BY.
- The licence permits redistribution, so the abstract is shown in full and the full text is available from the publisher.
Abstract
Recent discovery of oxic methane production in sea and lake waters, as well as wetlands, demands re-thinking of the global methane cycle and re-assessment of the contribution of oxic waters to atmospheric methane emission. Here we analysed system-wide sources and sinks of surface-water methane in a temperate lake. Using a mass balance analysis, we show that internal methane production in well-oxygenated surface water is an important source for surface-water methane during the stratified period. Combining our results and literature reports, oxic methane contribution to emission follows a predictive function of littoral sediment area and surface mixed layer volume. The contribution of oxic methane source(s) is predicted to increase with lake size, accounting for the majority (>50%) of surface methane emission for lakes with surface areas >1 km<sup>2</sup>.