Ecochemistry for Biogeochemical Cycles: Learning from Nature, Serving for Nature

Abstract

Since the industrial revolution, the rapid economic and industrial growth of human society has spread magnificent pressure on the Earth’s ecosystem. Particularly, the biogeochemical cycles (i.e., energy cycles of various elements in the ecosystem), which sustain the chemical substrate exchange among the biotic and abiotic components in the ecosystem, have been greatly interrupted, threatening the sustainability of the ecosystem. Against this background, ecochemistry, which studies the mechanism of the ecosystem and engineers the processes in nature for ecosystem reconstruction, has emerged as an important field of research. In this Perspective, we provide a brief overview and general idea of ecochemistry. Then, we pay special attention to the mechanism of biogeochemical cycles in the ecosystem. Thereafter, we describe recent achievements in ecochemistry toward repairing biogeochemical cycles for ecosystem reconstruction. Finally, we give a summary and future perspectives on the development of ecochemistry. This Perspective is expected to give a timely overview of the recent development in ecochemistry and to push forward the development in this field.