Functional Representation of Biological Components in Methane-Cycling Processes in Wetlands Improves Modeling Predictions

Wetlands are important natural sources of methane. However, methane predictions are unconstrained due in part to simplified representations in biogeochemical models of complex interactions between biological components and biophysical drivers. Chang et al. (2019, https://doi.org/10.1029/2019JG005355) demonstrate how mechanistic descriptions of processes mediated by biological components and their drivers help improve methane prediction in the thawing permafrost peatlands, where biological components are shifting as a response to current climate change. These findings underscore the need for accounting for the different methanogenic pathways in biogeochemical models to predict methane cycling under a changing climate scenario. This comment presents some implications of considering the methanogenic pathways when simulating different wetland ecosystems and discusses the relevance of including other processes mediated by biological components in the methane cycle in models.