BIWACLIM · Evaluating the effects of species composition and biodiversity on ecosystem water fluxes in a changing climate
FP6 — Marie Curie Actions (Human Resources and Mobility)
- Duration
- 2007-12-01 → 2010-11-30
- EU contribution
- €270,003
- Participants
- 2
- Scheme
- OIF
Lines connect the coordinator with its partners. CORDIS does not always give exact coordinates for projects before 2014. These points are placed at city or country level.
Results in brief
Final Activity and Management Report Summary - BIWACLIM (Evaluating the effects of species composition and biodiversity on ecosystem water fluxes in a changing climate)
Oxygen isotope composition (?18O) of plant materials responds to environmental and physiological change. When analysed in biological archives such as tree ring cellulose, ?18O signals in plant materials have therefore been suggested to be a potentially powerful tool that can be used to assess plant physiological or environmental change over time. However, several key uncertainties remain in the interpretation of ?18O signals in plant materials, which has prevented the general application of ?18O in ecological studies. The main goal of this Marie Curie Activity was to address these uncertainties using a combination of controlled experiments and model-based simulations. With this work, I was able to show that ?18O values in plant materials cannot be used for cross-species assessments of plant water relations e.g. transpiration as had been previously often hypothesized. Instead, the research that I was able to perform within the framework of the Marie Curie Fellowship showed that ?18O values of plant cellulose originating from a single species - such as cellulose in tree-ring time-series - can be integrated into a single environmental index of atmospheric drought - the leaf-to-air vapour pressure difference (VPD). The implications of this finding for both paleoclimatic and ecosystem research are substantial because VPD exerts strong controls on a plant's physiological performance it will also be a pivotal determinant of an ecosystem's carbon and water balance. Using ?18O values in plant material such as tree-ring time-series as a proxy for VPD has therefore an enormous potential for understanding temporal and spatial variation of one of the key environmental drivers that influences the biogeochemical dynamics of ecosystems be they past or present.
Data: CORDIS, © European Union
Project objective
Research addressing the effects of global change on ecosystem ecology has mainly focused on carbon cycling, while the consequences for ecosystem water pools and fluxes have received little attention. Given the important regulating role of the vegetation for ecosystem hydrology it is hypothesized that global change will not only affect ecosystem water relations directly (e.g. by altered precipitation patterns) but also indirectly through changes in plant water demand or altered plant species composition.The main goal of the proposed work will be to act here and to address the effects of species composition or biodiversity for ecosystem water pools and fluxes in a changing climate. In addition to established ecophysiological tools, a particular emphasis will be on the use of 18O isotopes in ecosystem water pools and fluxes to address the main goal of the study. 18O isotopes have been suggested as an indispensable tool for the understanding of ecosystem hydrology that allow a much deeper insight into patters and processes than conventional methods. Despite the high potential, however, uncertainties remain in the interpretation of d18O signals that have prevented the general application of d18O in ecological studies.In the outgoing phase of the proposed activity, these uncertainties will be addressed in experiments and observational studies. In particular, the potential of d18O in leaf water of different plants as an integrated measure of the plant's transpiration as well as the use of d18O in ecosystem water vapour to partition ecosystem evapotranspiration into the component fluxes for the validation of SVAT models will be evaluated. The improved understanding of d18O signals will finally be applied during the return phase of the activity to an ongoing climate change experiment in European grasslands to address the main scientific goal of the proposal, the effects of species composition and diversity on ecosystem water relations in a changing climate.
Original text from CORDIS.
Participants
- EIDGENOSSISCHE TECHNISCHE HOCHSCHULE ZURICH · ZURICHCoordinatorCity levelSwitzerland
- DEPARTMENT OF INTEGRATIVE BIOLOGY, UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA AT BERKELEY · BERKELEYCity levelUnited States
Links
Data: CORDIS, © European Union