AbstractMeasurements of carbon isotope contents of plant organic matter provide important information in diverse fields such as plant breeding, ecophysiology, biogeochemistry and paleoclimatology. They are currently based on13C/12C ratios of specific, whole metabolites, but we show here that intramolecular ratios provide higher resolution information. In the glucose units of tree-ring cellulose of 12 tree species, we detected large differences in13C/12C ratios (>10‰) among carbon atoms, which provide isotopically distinct inputs to major global C pools, including wood and soil organic matter. Thus, considering position-specific differences can improve characterisation of soil-to-atmosphere carbon fluxes and soil metabolism. In aPinus nigratree-ring archive formed from 1961 to 1995, we found novel13C signals, and show that intramolecular analysis enables more comprehensive and precise signal extraction from tree rings, and thus higher resolution reconstruction of plants’ responses to climate change. Moreover, we propose an ecophysiological mechanism for the introduction of a13C signal, which links an environmental shift to the triggered metabolic shift and its intramolecular13C signature. In conclusion, intramolecular13C analyses can provide valuable new information about long-term metabolic dynamics for numerous applications.