Modelling belowground plant acclimation to low soil nitrogen - a heuristic optimality-based approach

Increased root growth to access greater soil mineral nitrogen resources, and increased root exudation to stimulate microbial mineralisation of soil organic nitrogen, are widely observed plant acclimations to nitrogen limitation. However, the quantitative contribution of these belowground acclimations to whole plant growth and ecosystem productivity remains largely elusive. Here, we present a novel heuristic optimality-based eco-evolutionary nitrogen foraging model in which plants dynamically regulate carbon partitioning between root growth and exudation to maximise their aboveground growth. Our simulations indicated that the dynamic availability of soil mineral and organic nitrogen, as well as plant nitrogen demand and nitrogen uptake capacity, shape optimal carbon partitioning between root growth and exudation. The simulated carbon allocation patterns aligned with empirical studies on belowground plant responses to varying nitrogen resources in soil. These findings demonstrated the potential and versatility of our model to capture the quantitative importance of root and whole plant physiological acclimations for plant growth and productivity under fluctuating soil nitrogen availability. Our optimality-based approach represents a paradigmatic change in modelling plant nitrogen foraging, which is essential to generate hypotheses on optimal plant acclimations in future soil environments characterised by more erratic nitrogen availability.