scholarly journals Modelled net carbon gain responses to climate change in boreal trees: Impacts of photosynthetic parameter selection and acclimation

2018 ◽  
Vol 25 (4) ◽  
pp. 1445-1465 ◽  
Author(s):  
Joseph R. Stinziano ◽  
William L. Bauerle ◽  
Danielle A. Way
2014 ◽  
Vol 94 (6) ◽  
pp. 1091-1101 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jia Wang ◽  
Melissa Cheung ◽  
Lara Rasooli ◽  
Sasan Amirsadeghi ◽  
Greg C. Vanlerberghe

Wang, J., Cheung, M., Rasooli, L., Amirsadeghi, S. and Vanlerberghe, G. C. 2014. Plant respiration in a high CO2 world: How will alternative oxidase respond to future atmospheric and climatic conditions? Can. J. Plant Sci. 94: 1091–1101. Plant mitochondria contain an alternative oxidase (AOX) that reduces the energy yield of respiration. While respiration and photosynthesis are known to interact, the role of AOX in the light remains poorly understood. This gap in our understanding of leaf metabolism extends to future conditions of high CO2 and climate change. While studies indicate that AOX respiration is quite responsive to growth conditions, few studies have examined AOX respiration at high CO2 and little is known regarding the combined impact of changes in both CO2 and other climatic factors such as temperature and water availability. Given its non-energy conserving nature, a fundamental response by AOX to these future conditions could impact the net carbon gain that results from the combined processes of photosynthesis and respiration. Here, we show that leaf AOX protein amount in Nicotiana tabacum is dependent upon growth irradiance and CO2 level, that AOX is subject to biochemical control by intermediates of photorespiration, and that photosynthesis is impacted in transgenic plants lacking AOX. We also review findings that tobacco AOX respiration is responsive to climatic variables (temperature, water availability), thus providing an excellent experimental system to investigate the interplay between AOX, photosynthesis at high CO2, and climate change.


Land ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (4) ◽  
pp. 138 ◽  
Author(s):  
Belachew Gizachew ◽  
Svein Solberg ◽  
Stefano Puliti

Uganda designated 16% of its land as Protected Area (PA). The original goal was natural resources, habitat and biodiversity conservation. However, PAs also offer great potential for carbon conservation in the context of climate change mitigation. Drawing on a wall-to-wall map of forest carbon change for the entire Uganda, that was developed using two Digital Elevation Model (DEM) datasets for the period 2000–2012, we (1) quantified forest carbon gain and loss within 713 PAs and their external buffer zones, (2) tested variations in forest carbon change among management categories, and (3) evaluated the effectiveness of PAs and the prevalence of local leakage in terms of forest carbon. The net annual forest carbon gain in PAs of Uganda was 0.22 ± 1.36 t/ha, but a significant proportion (63%) of the PAs exhibited a net carbon loss. Further, carbon gain and loss varied significantly among management categories. About 37% of the PAs were “effective”, i.e., gained or at least maintained forest carbon during the period. Nevertheless, carbon losses in the external buffer zones of those effective PAs significantly contrast with carbon gains inside of the PA boundaries, providing evidence of leakage and thus, isolation. The combined carbon losses inside the boundaries of a large number of PAs, together with leakage in external buffer zones suggest that PAs, regardless of the management categories, are threatened by deforestation and forest degradation. If Uganda will have to benefit from carbon conservation from its large number of PAs through climate change mitigation mechanisms such as REDD+, there is an urgent need to look into some of the current PA management approaches, and design protection strategies that account for the surrounding landscapes and communities outside of the PAs.


1995 ◽  
Vol 27 (6) ◽  
pp. 559-565 ◽  
Author(s):  
Thomas H. Nash ◽  
Astrid G. Olafsen

AbstractUnder field conditions of optimal water hydration, lichen photosynthesis is primarily light-limited and nitrogen fixation is temperature-limited in both Peltigera canina and Stereocaulon tomentosum at Anaktuvuk Pass, Alaska. Thus, where duration of optimal hydration conditions remains unchanged from the present-day climate, the anticipated temperature increases in the Arctic may enhance nitrogen fixation in these lichens more than carbon gain. Because nitrogen frequently limits productivity in Arctic ecosystems, the results are potentially important to the many Arctic and subarctic ecosystems in which such lichens are abundant.


2022 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jefferson S. Hall ◽  
Joshua S. Plisinski ◽  
Stephanie K. Mladinich ◽  
Michiel van Breugel ◽  
Hao Ran Lai ◽  
...  

Abstract Context Tropical forest loss has a major impact on climate change. Secondary forest growth has potential to mitigate these impacts, but uncertainty regarding future land use, remote sensing limitations, and carbon model accuracy have inhibited understanding the range of potential future carbon dynamics. Objectives We evaluated the effects of four scenarios on carbon stocks and sequestration in a mixed-use landscape based on Recent Trends (RT), Accelerated Deforestation (AD), Grow Only (GO), and Grow Everything (GE) scenarios. Methods Working in central Panama, we coupled a 1-ha resolution LiDAR derived carbon map with a locally derived secondary forest carbon accumulation model. We used Dinamica EGO 4.0.5 to spatially simulate forest loss across the landscape based on recent deforestation rates. We used local studies of belowground, woody debris, and liana carbon to estimate ecosystem scale carbon fluxes. Results Accounting for 58.6 percent of the forest in 2020, secondary forests (< 50 years) accrue 88.9 percent of carbon in the GO scenario by 2050. RT and AD scenarios lost 36,707 and 177,035 ha of forest respectively by 2030, a carbon gain of 7.7 million Mg C (RT) and loss of 2.9 million Mg C (AD). Growing forest on all available land (GE) could achieve 56 percent of Panama’s land-based carbon sequestration goal by 2050. Conclusions Our estimates of potential carbon storage demonstrate the important contribution of secondary forests to land-based carbon sequestration in central Panama. Protecting these forests will contribute significantly to meeting Panama’s climate change mitigation goals and enhance water security.


2005 ◽  
Vol 35 (9) ◽  
pp. 2244-2257 ◽  
Author(s):  
D Bachelet ◽  
J Lenihan ◽  
R Neilson ◽  
R Drapek ◽  
T Kittel

The dynamic global vegetation model MC1 was used to examine climate, fire, and ecosystems interactions in Alaska under historical (1922–1996) and future (1997–2100) climate conditions. Projections show that by the end of the 21st century, 75%–90% of the area simulated as tundra in 1922 is replaced by boreal and temperate forest. From 1922 to 1996, simulation results show a loss of about 9 g C·m–2·year–1 from fire emissions and 360 000 ha burned each year. During the same period 61% of the C gained (1.7 Pg C) is lost to fires (1 Pg C). Under future climate change scenarios, fire emissions increase to 11–12 g C·m–2·year–1 and the area burned increases to 411 000 – 481 000 ha·year–1. The carbon gain between 2025 and 2099 is projected at 0.5 Pg C under the warmer CGCM1 climate change scenario and 3.2 Pg C under HADCM2SUL. The loss to fires under CGCM1 is thus greater than the carbon gained in those 75 years, while under HADCM2SUL it represents only about 40% of the carbon gained. Despite increases in fire losses, the model simulates an increase in carbon gains during the 21st century until its last decade, when, under both climate change scenarios, Alaska becomes a net carbon source.


2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (6) ◽  
pp. 723-729
Author(s):  
Roslyn Gleadow ◽  
Jim Hanan ◽  
Alan Dorin

Food security and the sustainability of native ecosystems depends on plant-insect interactions in countless ways. Recently reported rapid and immense declines in insect numbers due to climate change, the use of pesticides and herbicides, the introduction of agricultural monocultures, and the destruction of insect native habitat, are all potential contributors to this grave situation. Some researchers are working towards a future where natural insect pollinators might be replaced with free-flying robotic bees, an ecologically problematic proposal. We argue instead that creating environments that are friendly to bees and exploring the use of other species for pollination and bio-control, particularly in non-European countries, are more ecologically sound approaches. The computer simulation of insect-plant interactions is a far more measured application of technology that may assist in managing, or averting, ‘Insect Armageddon' from both practical and ethical viewpoints.


2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 221-231 ◽  
Author(s):  
Rebecca Millington ◽  
Peter M. Cox ◽  
Jonathan R. Moore ◽  
Gabriel Yvon-Durocher

Abstract We are in a period of relatively rapid climate change. This poses challenges for individual species and threatens the ecosystem services that humanity relies upon. Temperature is a key stressor. In a warming climate, individual organisms may be able to shift their thermal optima through phenotypic plasticity. However, such plasticity is unlikely to be sufficient over the coming centuries. Resilience to warming will also depend on how fast the distribution of traits that define a species can adapt through other methods, in particular through redistribution of the abundance of variants within the population and through genetic evolution. In this paper, we use a simple theoretical ‘trait diffusion’ model to explore how the resilience of a given species to climate change depends on the initial trait diversity (biodiversity), the trait diffusion rate (mutation rate), and the lifetime of the organism. We estimate theoretical dangerous rates of continuous global warming that would exceed the ability of a species to adapt through trait diffusion, and therefore lead to a collapse in the overall productivity of the species. As the rate of adaptation through intraspecies competition and genetic evolution decreases with species lifetime, we find critical rates of change that also depend fundamentally on lifetime. Dangerous rates of warming vary from 1°C per lifetime (at low trait diffusion rate) to 8°C per lifetime (at high trait diffusion rate). We conclude that rapid climate change is liable to favour short-lived organisms (e.g. microbes) rather than longer-lived organisms (e.g. trees).


2001 ◽  
Vol 70 (1) ◽  
pp. 47-61 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Moss ◽  
James Oswald ◽  
David Baines

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