Soil Incubation / Microbial Respiration data for boreal Alaska regions where burn frequency has increased (2019)

The experiment is designed to evaluate whether an increase in burn frequency causes changes in microbial respiration and affects rates of soil C (carbon) loss in boreal forest upland soils. Soils were collected from two burn complexes in north central Alaska, just south of the Yukon River. One was off the Dalton (DA) Highway and the other the Steese (ST) Highway. The areas have burned, in the 65 year prior to 2019, either 0 times (x), 1x, 2x, or 3x. Stands were previously upland black spruce. The data is from a ~127-day incubation of organic and mineral soils conducted in the laboratory under controlled temperature and moisture conditions. The samples were held at 15 °C (celsius) for 34 days, a temperature manipulation performed (2,5,10,15,20 °C) over ~23 days, and then the samples brought back to 15 °C for the remainder of the experiment. Samples from the incubated soils were analyzed for Carbon (C), Nitrogen (N) and Organic Matter (OM) concentrations.