Charcoal quality does not change over a century in a tropical agro-ecosystem

Charcoal stocks were determined in a chronosequence of soils which have been converted to agricultural land use by slash-and-burn up to 100 years ago. With time, opposite to our assumptions, the charcoal chemical quality, as measured by molecular markers for pyrogenic carbon, did not change and charcoal stocks did not show a clear decrease. Our results indicate that charcoal may resist chemical degradation even when exposed to intense weathering in a tropical climate. (C) 2011 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.