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At least 1,279 records · Page 71

Two interaction surfaces between XPA and RPA organize the preincision complex in nucleotide excision repair

The xeroderma pigmentosum protein A (XPA) and replication protein A (RPA) proteins fulfill essential roles in the assembly of the preincision complex in the nucleotide excision repair (NER) pathway. We have previously characterized the two interaction sites, one between the XPA N-terminal (XPA-N) disordered domain and the RPA32 C-terminal domain (RPA32C), and the other with the XPA DNA binding domain (DBD) and the RPA70AB DBDs. Here, we show that XPA mutations that inhibit the physical interaction in either site reduce NER activity in biochemical and cellular systems. Combining mutations in the two sites leads to an additive inhibition of NER, implying that they fulfill distinct roles. Our data suggest a model in which the interaction between XPA-N and RPA32C is important for the initial association of XPA with NER complexes, while the interaction between XPA DBD and RPA70AB is needed for structural organization of the complex to license the dual incision reaction. Integrative structural models of complexes of XPA and RPA bound to single-stranded/double-stranded DNA (ss/dsDNA) junction substrates that mimic the NER bubble reveal key features of the architecture of XPA and RPA in the preincision complex. Most critical among these is that the shape of the NER bubble is far from colinear as depicted in current models, but rather the two strands of unwound DNA must assume a U-shape with the two ss/dsDNA junctions localized in close proximity. Our data suggest that the interaction between XPA and RPA70 is key for the organization of the NER preincision complex.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗

Detailed study of quark-hadron duality in spin structure functions of the proton and neutron

Background: The response of hadrons, the bound states of the strong force (QCD), to external probes can be described in two different, complementary frameworks: as direct interactions with their fundamental constituents, quarks and gluons, or alternatively as elastic or inelastic coherent scattering that leaves the hadrons in their ground state or in one of their excited (resonance) states. The former picture emerges most clearly in hard processes with high momentum transfer, where the hadron response can be described by the perturbative expansion of QCD, while at lower energy and momentum transfers, the resonant excitations of the hadrons dominate the cross section. The overlap region between these two pictures, where both yield similar predictions, is referred to as quark-hadron duality and has been extensively studied in reactions involving unpolarized hadrons. Some limited information on this phenomenon also exists for polarized protons, deuterons, and 3 He nuclei, but not yet for neutrons. Purpose: In this paper, we present comprehensive and detailed results on the correspondence between the extrapolated deep inelastic structure function g 1 of both the proton and the neutron with the same quantity measured in the nucleon resonance region. Thanks to the fine binning and high precision of our data, and using a well-controlled perturbative QCD (pQCD) fit for the partonic prediction, we can make quantitative statements about the kinematic range of applicability of both local duality and global duality. Method: We use the most updated QCD global analysis results at high x from the Jefferson Lab Angular Momentum Collaboration to extrapolate the spin structure function g 1 into the nucleon resonance region and then integrate over various intervals in the scaling variable x. We compare the results with the large data set collected in the quark-hadron transition region by the CLAS Collaboration, including, for the first time, deconvoluted neutron data, integrated over the same intervals. We present this comparison as a function of the momentum transfer Q 2 . Results: We find that, depending on the integration interval and the minimum momentum transfer chosen, a clear transition to quark-hadron duality can be observed in both nucleon species. Furthermore, we show, for the first time, the approach to scaling behavior for g 1 measured in the resonance region at sufficiently high momentum transfer. Conclusions: Here, our results can be used to quantify the deviations from the applicability of pQCD for data taken at moderate energies and can help with extraction of quark distribution functions from such data.

73 NUCLEAR PHYSICS AND RADIATION PHYSICS↗

Density functionals combined with van der Waals corrections for graphene adsorbed on layered materials

Standard density functionals like Perdew-Burke-Ernzerhof (PBE) or Strongly Constrained and Appropriately Normed (SCAN) need a correction to account for long-range van der Waals (vdW) interaction. The damped Zaremba-Kohn model (dZK) starts from a formula for the vdW interaction of a distant atom with a solid surface, both with known dielectric properties, damps this formula at short range, and then treats an adsorbed molecule or atomic layer as a collection of renormalized atoms. Here, we extend this model to graphene adsorbed on semiconducting layered materials [bulk graphite and hBN, and multilayer transition metal dichalcogenides (TMD)] by including the C 4 asymptotic term and multiple electrostatic image effects due to the two surfaces of the substrate slabs in the vdW calculations. The resulting SCAN-vdW-dZK and PBE-vdW-dZK give approximately the same results for the systems considered here, in agreement with available reference values. The predicted binding energies are roughly 25% lower than those from SCAN+rVV10 (revised Vydrov and Van Voorhis 2010), and ~15% lower than those from PBE+rVV10. Since SCAN+rVV10 usually overbinds, the predicted binding energies by SCAN-vdW-dZK and PBE-vdW-dZK are expected to be closer to the true values. The predicted equilibrium binding distances from SCAN-vdW-dZK and PBE-vdW-dZK are slightly larger (~ 0.1 Å) than those from SCAN+rVV10, and close to those from SCAN. The binding energy depends upon the number of substrate layers more strongly in vdW-dZK than in rVV10. The C 4 -term contributions can be 40% of the total vdW interactions, and the C 5 term contributes about 10%. The effects of images and the back surfaces of slabs can contribute about 4–10%. The vdW interaction energy power laws from the vdW-dZK model for graphene adsorbed on multilayer MoS 2 show slowly varying decay to the pairwise exponent –4 with increasing separation $\textit{D}$, very similar to those obtained from the random-phase approximation and renormalization group approaches by Ambrosetti et al. Both the PBE-vdW-dZK and SCAN-vdW-dZK give a greater increase in interlayer binding energy when the TMD substrate changes from monolayer to four-layer for the graphene/TMD adsorption systems. This is consistent with the relevant electron-energy-loss spectroscopy experimental results showing increased dielectric response from the substrate with increasing substrate layer number.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗

Leptonic scalars at the LHC

We explore the collider prospects of neutrino non-standard interaction with a Standard Model (SM) gauge-singlet leptonic scalar ϕ carrying two units of lepton-number-charge. These leptonic scalars are forbidden from interacting with the SM fermions at the renormalizable level and, if one allows for higher-dimensional operators, couple predominantly to SM neutrinos. For masses at or below the electroweak scale, ϕ decays exclusively into neutrinos. Its characteristic production signature at hadron collider experiments like the LHC would be via the vector boson fusion process and leads to same-sign dileptons, two forward jets in opposite hemispheres, and missing transverse energy, i.e., $$ pp\to {\mathrm{\ell}}_{\alpha}^{\pm }{\mathrm{\ell}}_{\beta}^{\pm } jj+{E}_T^{\mathrm{miss}}\left(\alpha, \beta =e,\mu, \tau \right) $$ pp → ℓ α ± ℓ β ± jj + E T miss α β = e μ τ . Exploiting the final states of electrons and muons, we estimate, for the first time, the sensitivity of the LHC to these lepton-number-charged scalars. We show that the LHC sensitivity is largely complementary to that of low-energy precision measurements of the decays of charged leptons, charged mesons, W , Z and the SM Higgs boson, as well as the neutrino beam experiments like MINOS, and searches for neutrino self-interactions at IceCube and in cosmological observations. For ϕ mass larger than roughly 10 GeV, our projected LHC sensitivity would surpass all existing bounds.

71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSIC↗

Margin to onset of nucleate boiling and flow instability studies for preliminary MITR design-demonstration element thermal-hydraulics

This study covers the onset of flow instability (OFI) preliminary results obtained from leveraging correlations, in addition to the preliminary thermal hydraulics results such as pressure, flow velocity, temperature, and oxide layer over the design demonstration experiment (DDE) for the Massachusetts Institute of Technology Reactor (MITR). Current computational fluid dynamics (CFD) models in fluid structure interaction (FSI) have added the capability of assessing margins to onset of nucleate boiling (ONB). This study initiates the capability to model the margin to OFI and ONB presented for the MITR. Such study is supportive of the United States High Performance Research Reactor (USHPRR) program. Previous studies provided preliminary thermal-hydraulic and mechanical analyses of the hydrodynamic effects in the MITR DDE under conservative approximations for plate power distribution. In conclusion, this study focuses on providing insights into the OFI future research direction optimizing the transport of thermal energy, mass-flow rates, flow-channel geometries, and boundary conditions.

11 - NUCLEAR FUEL CYCLE AND FUEL MATERIALS↗

A multiscale model of immune surveillance in micrometastases gives insights on cancer patient digital twins

Abstract Metastasis is the leading cause of death in patients with cancer, driving considerable scientific and clinical interest in immunosurveillance of micrometastases. We investigated this process by creating a multiscale mathematical model to study the interactions between the immune system and the progression of micrometastases in general epithelial tissue. We analyzed the parameter space of the model using high-throughput computing resources to generate over 100,000 virtual patient trajectories. We demonstrated that the model could recapitulate a wide variety of virtual patient trajectories, including uncontrolled growth, partial response, and complete immune response to tumor growth. We classified the virtual patients and identified key patient parameters with the greatest effect on the simulated immunosurveillance. We highlight the lessons derived from this analysis and their impact on the nascent field of cancer patient digital twins (CPDTs). While CPDTs could enable clinicians to systematically dissect the complexity of cancer in each individual patient and inform treatment choices, our work shows that key challenges remain before we can reach this vision. In particular, we show that there remain considerable uncertainties in immune responses, unreliable patient stratification, and unpredictable personalized treatment. Nonetheless, we also show that in spite of these challenges, patient-specific models suggest strategies to increase control of clinically undetectable micrometastases even without complete parameter certainty.

Mathematical & Computational Biology↗

Informed Investments in Clean Energy Technologies

Governments and companies face consequential decisions about allocating resources to the research, development, demonstration and deployment of energy technologies to meet environmental, economic and social goals. Here we discuss how research insights can inform and potentially improve these decisions to make effective use of limited resources and time in shaping the next-generation energy infrastructure. We outline three key research steps: forecasting technological change, relating investments to economic, social and environmental outcomes and informing decision-making processes. We recommend advances to address uncertainty as well as to make methods and results more practicable, emphasizing the importance of model validation, streamlining and interactivity. Progress has been made, yet further work is needed-for example, in the development of reduced-order, testable models and more comprehensive data collection. Overall, this research is beginning to inform decisions but could be adopted more widely by governments and the private sector to help support technological progress for energy affordability, equitable climate change mitigation, health benefits and other objectives.

29 ENERGY PLANNING, POLICY, AND ECONOMY↗

Phase Field Dislocation Dynamics (PFDD) version 2.x

This disclosure is for version 2.x of a mesoscale model called Phase Field Dislocation Dynamics (PFDD). PFDD is used for investigating deformation in nanoscale (grain sizes of ~300 nm and less) materials, such as metals and alloys. This approach models the motion and interaction of individual defects, namely dislocations, in the material using scalar-valued phase field variables, also called order parameters. The system is evolved through energy minimization thus the model calculates the total energy density in terms of the phase field variables. The energy minimization is completed using the Ginzburg-Landau equation, and is implemented with explicit time integration. The total system energy can be comprised of several terms, including the strain energy (which describes dislocation-dislocation interactions), the energy due to an applied stress (dislocation interactions with the applied stress), and a core/lattice (perfect dislocations) or generalized stacking fault (partial dislocations) energy (described the dislocation core structure). The latter term in particular may vary based on the crystal structure being modeled and is typically informed using lower length scale (e.g., atomistic) approaches, although no such (atomistic) calculations are completed within the PFDD algorithm. This basic formulation was previously reviewed by Los Alamos National Laboratory and released under license number C17113. This previously reviewed version we will henceforth refer to as PFDD v1.0. PFDD v1.0 consisted of 2 codes (one parallel and one serial) plus input files, all written in the C language. This new disclosure is addressing the next versions of the PFDD, versions 2.x. There have been several enhancements of PFDD v1.0, which are described here and included in the attached code, which we will refer to as PFDD v2.0. There are also several new features described here that are either planned or already in process and are expected to be subsequent releases, i.e., v2.1, v2.2, ...v2.x.

Hunter, Abigail↗

Competition within low-density bacterial populations as an unexpected factor regulating carbon decomposition in bulk soil

Bacterial decomposition of organic matter in soils is generally believed to be mainly controlled by the access bacteria have to organic substrate. The influence of bacterial traits on this control has, however, received little attention. Using the substrate-dependent Monod growth model, we develop a bioreactive transport model to screen the interactive impacts of spatial dispersion and bacterial traits on mineralization. Bacterial traits primarily involved in the bacterial response to the substrate concentration, such as the maximum specific uptake rate and efficiency, the adaptation time of the uptake rate and the initial population density, are considered. We compare the model results with two sets of previously performed cm-scale soil-core experiments in which the mineralization of the pesticide 2,4-D was measured under well-controlled initial distributions and transport conditions. Bacterial dispersion away from the initial substrate location induced a significant increase in 2,4-D mineralization. Additionally, it reveals an increase of specific uptake rates at lower bacterial densities, more than compensating the decrease of specific uptake rates caused by substrate dilution. This regulation of bacterial activities by density, caused by the local depletion of substrate by competing bacteria, becomes dominant for bacteria with an efficient uptake of substrate at low substrate concentrations (a common feature of oligotrophs). Such oligotrophs, commonly found in soils, compete with each other for substrate even at remarkably low population densities. The ratio-dependent Contois growth model, which includes a density regulation in the expression of the uptake efficiency, is more accurate and convenient to calibrate than the substrate-dependent Monod model, at least under these conditions. In view of their strong interactions, bioreactive and transport processes cannot be handled independently but should be integrated, in particular when reactive processes of interest are carried out by oligotrophs.

59 BASIC BIOLOGICAL SCIENCES↗

Hyperstealth dark matter and long-lived particles

A new dark matter candidate is proposed that arises as the lightest baryon from a confining 𝑆⁢𝑈⁡(𝑁) gauge theory which equilibrates with the Standard Model only through electroweak interactions. Surprisingly, this candidate can be as light as a few GeV. The lower bound arises from the intersection of two competing requirements: (i) the equilibration sector of the model must be sufficiently heavy, at least several TeV, to avoid bounds from colliders, and (ii) the lightest dark meson (that may be the dark 𝜂′, 𝜎, or the lightest glueball) has suppressed interactions with the SM and must decay before big bang nucleosynthesis. The low-energy dark sector consists of one flavor that is electrically neutral and an almost electroweak singlet. The dark matter candidate is the lightest baryon consisting of 𝑁 of these light flavors leading to a highly suppressed elastic scattering rate with the Standard Model (SM). The equilibration sector consists of vectorlike dark quarks that transform under the electroweak group, ensuring that the dark sector can reach thermal equilibrium with the SM in the early Universe. The lightest dark meson lifetimes vary between 10 −3 ≲ 𝑐⁢𝜏 ≲ 10 7 m, providing an outstanding target for LHC production and experimental detection. We delineate the interplay between the lifetime of the light mesons, the suppressed direct detection cross section of the lightest baryon, and the scale of equilibration sector that can be probed at the LHC.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗

Ab Initio Electron-Phonon Interactions in Correlated Electron Systems

Electron-phonon ( e - ph ) interactions are pervasive in condensed matter, governing phenomena such as transport, superconductivity, charge-density waves, polarons, and metal-insulator transitions. First-principles approaches enable accurate calculations of e - ph interactions in a wide range of solids. However, they remain an open challenge in correlated electron systems (CES), where density functional theory often fails to describe the ground state. Therefore reliable e - ph calculations remain out of reach for many transition metal oxides, high-temperature superconductors, Mott insulators, planetary materials, and multiferroics. Here we show first-principles calculations of e - ph interactions in CES, using the framework of Hubbard-corrected density functional theory ( DFT + U ) and its linear response extension ( DFPT + U ), which can describe the electronic structure and lattice dynamics of many CES. We showcase the accuracy of this approach for a prototypical Mott system, CoO, carrying out a detailed investigation of its e - ph interactions and electron spectral functions. While standard DFPT gives unphysically divergent and short-ranged e - ph interactions, DFPT + U is shown to remove the divergences and properly account for the long-range Fröhlich interaction, allowing us to model polaron effects in a Mott insulator. Our work establishes a broadly applicable and affordable approach for quantitative studies of e - ph interactions in CES, a novel theoretical tool to interpret experiments in this broad class of materials.

72 PHYSICS OF ELEMENTARY PARTICLES AND FIELDS↗

Modeling the effect of MHD activity on runaway electron generation during SPARC disruptions

Magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) instabilities and runaway electrons (REs) interact in several ways, making it important to self-consistently model these interactions for accurate predictions of RE generation and the design of mitigation strategies, such as massive gas injection (MGI). Using M3D-C1 – an extended MHD code with a RE fluid model – we investigate the effects of 3-D nonlinear MHD activity, material injection, and 2-D axisymmetric vertical displacement events (VDEs) on RE evolution during disruptions on SPARC – a high-field, high-current tokamak designed to achieve a fusion gain Q > 1. Several cases, comprising different combinations of neon (Ne) and deuterium (D 2 ) injection, are considered. Here, our results demonstrate key effects that arise from the self-consistent RE + MHD coupling, such as an initial increase in RE generation due to MHD instability growth, decreased saturation energies of the m/n = 1/1 mode driving sawteeth-like activity, RE losses in stochastic magnetic fields, and subsequent RE confinement and plateau formation due to re-healing of flux surfaces. Large RE plateaus (>5 MA) are obtained with Ne-only injection (2-5 × 10 21 atoms), while combined D 2 + Ne injection (2 × 10 21 Ne atoms; 1.8 × 10 22 D 2 molecules) produces a lower RE current (<2 MA). With D 2 + Ne injection, a post thermal quench "cold" VDE terminates the RE beam, preventing a steady plateau. These simulations couple REs, 3-D MHD instabilities, MGI, and axisymmetric VDEs for the first time in SPARC disruption simulations and represent a crucial step in understanding RE generation and mitigation in high-current devices like SPARC.

Datta, Rishabh [Massachusetts Inst. of Technology ↗

Semi-Analytical Hierarchical Bayesian Inference of Nonlinear Model Structure in Stochastic Dynamics: Applied to Compartmental Models of Infectious Diseases

A Bayesian computational framework for parsimonious inference in stochastic nonlinear dynamical systems is presented. This framework enables the concurrent estimation of system states, time-varying parameters, time-invariant parameters, and the optimal sparsity structure of the model parameters. Because differential equation-based models are often simplified mechanistic or phenomenological representations, robust inference from noisy measurement data requires explicit treatment of model error and uncertainty. Model error and time-varying parameters can be represented as random processes, enabling inference while making minimal assumptions about the underlying sources of discrepancy and variability. Adopting stochastic differential equation representations affords the model significant flexibility, but can also render it susceptible to overfitting during statistical inversion, where the inferred model may track noise rather than the underlying signal. To alleviate the effects of overfitting and to enable the discovery of the optimal sparse representation of the time-invariant parameters, a Bayesian sparse learning algorithm is embedded within the framework. This sparse learning framework adopts an approximate hierarchical Bayesian setting defined by a series of semi-analytical expressions. The model structure inference framework is validated using a stochastic compartmental model for tracking and forecasting active cases of an infectious disease. Compartmental models describe population-level infectious disease dynamics through interactions among population fractions grouped by disease state. Mathematically, such models consist of a system of coupled ordinary differential equations. This example adopts an expressive compartmental model that includes multiple possible interactions between disease states, motivated by early uncertainty surrounding COVID-19 reinfection dynamics and their implications for long-term epidemic forecasting. The sparse learning exercise permits the inference of a priori unknown epidemiological dynamics from simulated public health data, discovering the nested compartmental model that optimizes the trade-off between average data-fit and model complexity. It is shown that inducing sparsity among the model parameters eliminates redundant interactions between compartments, equivalently revealing the optimal coupling structure between differential equations.

97 MATHEMATICS AND COMPUTING↗

Structured interactions drive abrupt transitions in the spatial organization of microbial communities

Bacteria possess diverse mechanisms to regulate their motility in response to environmental and physiological signals, enabling them to navigate complex habitats and adapt their behavior. Some of these mechanisms are species specific and enable cells to modulate their movement based on the ecological identity of neighboring species. Here, we introduce a model in which bacteria interact via local signals that either enhance or suppress the motility of neighboring cells depending on species type. Through large-scale simulations and a coarse-grained stochastic model, we demonstrate the emergence of a sharp transition driven by nucleation processes: increasing the density of motility-suppressing interactions drives the system from a fully mixed, motile phase to a state characterized by large, stationary bacterial clusters. Remarkably, in systems with a large number of interacting species, this transition can be triggered solely by altering the structure of the motility-regulation interaction matrix while maintaining species and interaction densities constant. In particular, we find that heterogeneous and modular interactions promote the transition more readily than homogeneous random ones. These findings add a dimension to the theory of motility-induced phase separation and contribute to the ongoing effort to understand microbial interactions, suggesting that structured, nonrandom ones may be key to reproducing commonly observed spatial patterns in microbial communities.

bacterial communities↗

Single classical field description of interacting scalar fields

In this report we test the degree to which interacting Bosonic systems can be approximated by a classical field as total occupation number is increased. This is done with our publicly available code repository, QIBS, a new massively parallel solver for these systems. We use a number of toy models well studied in the literature and track when the classical field description admits quantum corrections, called the quantum breaktime. This allows us to test claims in the literature regarding the rate of convergence of these systems to the classical evolution. We test a number of initial conditions, including coherent states, number eigenstates, and field number states. We find that of these initial conditions, only number eigenstates do not converge to the classical evolution as occupation number is increased. We find that systems most similar to scalar field dark matter exhibit a logarithmic enhancement in the quantum breaktime with total occupation number. Systems with contact interactions or with field number state initial conditions, and linear dispersions, exhibit a power law enhancement. Finally, we find that the breaktime scaling depends on both model interactions and initial conditions.

79 ASTRONOMY AND ASTROPHYSICS↗

Development and Evaluation of E3SM‐MOSAIC: Spatial Distributions and Radiative Effects of Nitrate Aerosol

Abstract Nitrate aerosol plays an important role in affecting regional air quality as well as Earth's climate. However, it is not well represented or even neglected in many global climate models. In this study, we couple the Model for Simulating Aerosol Interactions and Chemistry (MOSAIC) module with the four‐mode version of the Modal Aerosol Module (MAM4) in DOE's Energy Exascale Earth System Model version 2 (E3SMv2) to simulate nitrate aerosol and its radiative effects. We find that nitrate aerosol simulated by E3SMv2‐MAM4‐MOSAIC is sensitive to the treatment of gaseous HNO 3 transfer to/from interstitial particles related to accommodation coefficients of HNO 3 ( ) on dust and non‐dust particles. We compare three different treatments of HNO 3 transfer: (a) a treatment (MTC_SLOW) that uses a low in the mass transfer coefficient (MTC) calculation; (b) a dust‐weighted MTC treatment (MTC_WGT) that uses a high on non‐dust particles; and (c) a dust‐weighted MTC treatment that also splits coarse mode aerosols into the coarse dust and sea salt sub‐modes in MOSAIC (MTC_SPLC). MTC_WGT and MTC_SPLC increase the global annual mean (2005–2014) nitrate burden from 0.096 (MTC_SLOW) to 0.237 and 0.185 Tg N, respectively, mostly in the coarse mode. MTC_WGT and MTC_SPLC also produce stronger nitrate direct radiative forcing (−0.048 and −0.051 W m −2 , respectively) and indirect forcing (−0.33 and −0.35 W m −2 , respectively) than MTC_SLOW (−0.021 and −0.24 W m −2 ). MTC_WGT and MTC_SPLC improve nitrate surface concentrations over remote oceans based on limited observations and vertical profiles of nitrate concentrations against aircraft measurements below 400 hPa.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗

Magnon Landau Levels and Spin Responses in Antiferromagnets

We study gauge fields produced by gradients of the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction and propose a model of an AFM topological insulator of magnons. In the long wavelength limit, the Landau levels induced by the inhomogeneous Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction exhibit relativistic physics described by the Klein-Gordon equation. The spin Nernst response due to the formation of magnonic Landau levels is compared to similar topological responses in skyrmion and vortex-antivortex crystal phases of AFM insulators. Here, our studies show that AFM insulators exhibit rich physics associated with topological magnon excitations.

75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND↗

Quantifying the role of moss in terrestrial ecosystem carbon dynamics in northern high latitudes

Mosses are ubiquitous in northern terrestrial ecosystems, and play an important role in regional carbon, water and energy cycling. Current global land surface models that do not consider mosses may bias the quantification of regional carbon dynamics. Here we incorporate mosses as a new plant functional type into the process-based Terrestrial Ecosystem Model (TEM 5.0), to develop a new model (TEM_Moss). The new model explicitly quantifies the interactions between vascular plants and mosses and their competition for energy, water, and nutrients. Compared to the estimates using TEM 5.0, the new model estimates that the regional terrestrial soils currently store 132.7 Pg more C and will store 157.5 and 179.1 Pg more C under the RCP8.5 and RCP2.6 scenarios, respectively, by the end of the 21st century. Ensemble regional simulations forced with different parameters for the 21st century with TEM_Moss predict that the region will accumulate 161.1±142.1 Pg C under the RCP2.6 scenario and 186.7±166.1 Pg C under the RCP8.5 scenario over the century. Our study highlights the necessity of coupling moss into Earth system models to adequately quantify terrestrial carbon–climate feedbacks in the Arctic.

54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES↗