Dataset Information

Evaluating the responses of forest ecosystems to climate change and CO₂ using dynamic global vegetation models.

ABSTRACT: The climate has important influences on the distribution and structure of forest ecosystems, which may lead to vital feedback to climate change. However, much of the existing work focuses on the changes in carbon fluxes or water cycles due to climate change and/or atmospheric CO ₂, and few studies have considered how and to what extent climate change and CO ₂ influence the ecosystem structure (e.g., fractional coverage change) and the changes in the responses of ecosystems with different characteristics. In this work, two dynamic global vegetation models (DGVMs): IAP-DGVM coupled with CLM3 and CLM4-CNDV, were used to investigate the response of the forest ecosystem structure to changes in climate (temperature and precipitation) and CO ₂ concentration. In the temperature sensitivity tests, warming reduced the global area-averaged ecosystem gross primary production in the two models, which decreased global forest area. Furthermore, the changes in tree fractional coverage (?F_tree; %) from the two models were sensitive to the regional temperature and ecosystem structure, i.e., the mean annual temperature (MAT; °C) largely determined whether ?F_tree was positive or negative, while the tree fractional coverage (F_tree; %) played a decisive role in the amplitude of ?F_tree around the globe, and the dependence was more remarkable in IAP-DGVM. In cases with precipitation change, F_tree had a uniformly positive relationship with precipitation, especially in the transition zones of forests (30% < F_tree < 60%) for IAP-DGVM and in semiarid and arid regions for CLM4-CNDV. Moreover, ?F_tree had a stronger dependence on F_tree than on the mean annual precipitation (MAP; mm/year). It was also demonstrated that both models captured the fertilization effects of the CO ₂ concentration.

SUBMITTER: Song X

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5288257 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Feb

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature

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Evaluating the responses of forest ecosystems to climate change and CO2 using dynamic global vegetation models.

Song Xiang X Zeng Xiaodong X

Ecology and evolution 20170117 3

The climate has important influences on the distribution and structure of forest ecosystems, which may lead to vital feedback to climate change. However, much of the existing work focuses on the changes in carbon fluxes or water cycles due to climate change and/or atmospheric CO 2, and few studies have considered how and to what extent climate change and CO 2 influence the ecosystem structure (e.g., fractional coverage change) and the changes in the responses of ecosystems ...[more]

PMID: 28168035

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Project description:Future vegetation shifts under changing climate are uncertain for forests with infrequent stand-replacing disturbance regimes. These high-inertia forests may have long persistence even with climate change because disturbance-free periods can span centuries, broad-scale regeneration opportunities are fewer relative to frequent-fire systems, and mature tree species are long-lived with relatively high tolerance for sub-optimal growing conditions. Here, we used a combination of empirical and process-based modeling approaches to examine vegetation projections across high-inertia forests of Washington State, USA, under different climate and wildfire futures. We ran our models without forest management (to assess inherent system behavior/potential) and also with wildfire suppression. Projections suggested relatively stable mid-elevation forests through the end of the century despite anticipated increases in wildfire. The largest changes were projected at the lowest and uppermost forest boundaries, with upward expansion of the driest low-elevation forests and contraction of cold, high-elevation subalpine parklands. While forests were overall relatively stable in simulations, increases in early-seral conditions and decreases in late-seral conditions occurred as wildfire became more frequent. With partial fire suppression, projected changes were dampened or delayed, suggesting a potential tool to forestall change in some (but not all) high-inertia forests, especially since extending fire-free periods does little to alter overall fire regimes in these systems. Model projections also illustrated the importance of fire regime context and projection limitations; the time horizon over which disturbances will eventually allow the system to shift are so long that the prevailing climatic conditions under which many of those shifts will occur are beyond what most climate models can predict with any certainty. This will present a fundamental challenge to setting expectations and managing for long-term change in these systems.

Dataset Information

Evaluating the responses of forest ecosystems to climate change and CO₂ using dynamic global vegetation models.

Publications

Evaluating the responses of forest ecosystems to climate change and CO<sub>2</sub> using dynamic global vegetation models.

Similar Datasets

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