Aerobic and Anaerobic Nonmicrobial Methane Emissions from Plant Material

Methane (CH(4)) may be generated via microbial and nonmicrobial mechanisms. Nonmicrobial CH(4) is also ubiquitous in nature, such as in biomass burning, the Earth's crust, plants, and animals. Relative to microbial CH(4), nonmicrobial CH(4) is less understood. Using fresh (living) and dried (dead) leaves and commercial structural compounds (dead) of plants, a series of laboratory experiments have been conducted to investigate CH(4) emissions under aerobic and anaerobic conditions. CH(4) emissions from fresh leaves incubated at ambient temperatures were nonmicrobial and enhanced by anaerobic conditions. CH(4) emissions from dried leaves incubated at rising temperature ruled out a microbial-mediated formation pathway and were plant-species-dependent with three categories of response to oxygen levels: enhanced by aerobic conditions, similar under aerobic and anaerobic conditions, and enhanced by anaerobic conditions. CH(4) emissions in plant structural compounds may help to fully understand nonmicrobial CH(4) formation in plant leaves. Experiments of reactive oxygen species (ROS) generator and scavengers indicate that ROS had a significant role in nonmicrobial CH(4) formation in plant material under aerobic and anaerobic conditions. However, the detailed mechanisms of the ROS were uncertain.