Аннотация:The impact of C:N and of internal and external nitrogen on plant residues (corn leaves) decomposition was studied in a series of long-Term laboratory incubation experiments: without nitrogen addition (internal organic and inorganic N), with KNO3 and NH4NO3 addition (external N). Mineralization rates of the labile and the recalcitrant carbon pools were estimated by fitting 365-day cumulative CO2 losses by double-pool exponential decay function. It has been shown that decrease of C:N leads to stimulated mineralization at the early stages of decomposition (first 20 days of incubation). The value of C:N affects the k1 parameter of the double exponential decay model of plant residues. The decomposition constant of the labile carbon pool directly depends on C:N in the C:N range from 22 to 62, but decreases under the stress of high doses of internal (C:N = 22) and external (C:N = 10) nitrogen. The internal organic nitrogen affected the decay constant (k1) of the labile pool only. KNO3 as an external N form influenced the size (A1) and k1 value of the labile pool. NH4NO3 affected all the parameters of the double exponential decay including constant (k2) of the recalcitrant pool, and also resulted in intensive transformation of plant residues (humification index alkyl/O-Alkyl increased from 0.33 to 0.51). Thus, mineralization and humification of plant residues depends on C:N ratio, origin and form of available nitrogen. The internal nitrogen in plants and the external nitrogen (KNO3 and NH4NO3) affect in the same direction, but the effect of external nitrogen is more pronounced than of internal, and of ammonium nitrogen is more than that of nitrate nitrogen.