Abstract:The study of alpine grassland carbon storage and its influencing factors is one of the keys to understand the carbon cycle and climate change of grassland ecosystem and even terrestrial ecosystem on the Qinghai Tibet Plateau. In this paper, the regression relationship between the ground survey data in early August 2021 and the remote sensing data of Gaofen-6 in the same period was established. Based on the inversion of the above-ground and below-ground biomass carbon density of vegetation and the organic carbon density of 0-40 cm soil layer in the study area, the organic carbon storage of alpine grassland in the source region of the Yellow River was estimated, and the driving mechanism of the impact of soil physical and chemical properties on carbon density was discussed through path analysis. The results showed that: (1) In 2021, the above-ground biomass, below-ground biomass and carbon density of 0-40 cm soil layer in the source region of the Yellow River were 37.65 g/m2, 1305.28 g/m2 and 4769.11 g/m2, respectively. The total carbon storage was 100.44 Tg (1 Tg=1012 g). The carbon storage of vegetation layer and soil layer was 22.06 Tg and 78.38 Tg, accounting for 21.96% and 78.04% of the total carbon density respectively. (2) The above-ground biomass carbon density of alpine meadow and alpine steppe in the source region of the Yellow River was 41.27 g/m2 and 30.76 g/m2 respectively; The below-ground biomass carbon density was 1661.41 g/m2 and 618.74 g/m2 respectively; The organic carbon density of 0-40 cm soil layer was 5790.99 g/m2 and 2804.04 g/m2 respectively; The spatial distribution of carbon density in the study area was generally high in the south and low in the north, and the distribution pattern was consistent with the distribution characteristics of surface vegetation types. (3) Path analysis showed that the physical and chemical properties of soil in the study area were closely related to the carbon density of grassland. The above-ground biomass carbon density was mainly driven by soil total phosphorus content and soil moisture, the below-ground biomass carbon density was mainly driven by soil total nitrogen content and soil bulk, and the soil organic carbon density was mainly driven by the below-ground biomass carbon density, soil bulk and pH.