Hotspot analyses indicate significant conservation gaps for evergreen broadleaved woody plants in China.
Ontology highlight
ABSTRACT:
SUBMITTER: Xu Y
PROVIDER: S-EPMC5431964 | biostudies-literature |
REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature
Similar Datasets
Project description:Climate change has caused shifts in species' ranges and extinctions of high-latitude and altitude species. Most cold-tolerant evergreen broadleaved woody plants (shortened to cold-evergreens below) are rare species occurring in a few sites in the alpine and subalpine zones in the Korean Peninsula. The aim of this research is to 1) identify climate factors controlling the range of cold-evergreens in the Korean Peninsula; and 2) predict the climate change effects on the range of cold-evergreens. We used multimodel inference based on combinations of climate variables to develop distribution models of cold-evergreens at a physiognomic-level. Presence/absence data of 12 species at 204 sites and 6 climatic factors, selected from among 23 candidate variables, were used for modeling. Model uncertainty was estimated by mapping a total variance calculated by adding the weighted average of within-model variation to the between-model variation. The range of cold-evergreens and model performance were validated by true skill statistics, the receiver operating characteristic curve and the kappa statistic. Climate change effects on the cold-evergreens were predicted according to the RCP 4.5 and RCP 8.5 scenarios. Multimodel inference approach excellently projected the spatial distribution of cold-evergreens (AUC = 0.95, kappa = 0.62 and TSS = 0.77). Temperature was a dominant factor in model-average estimates, while precipitation was minor. The climatic suitability increased from the southwest, lowland areas, to the northeast, high mountains. The range of cold-evergreens declined under climate change. Mountain-tops in the south and most of the area in the north remained suitable in 2050 and 2070 under the RCP 4.5 projection and 2050 under the RCP 8.5 projection. Only high-elevations in the northeastern Peninsula remained suitable under the RCP 8.5 projection. A northward and upper-elevational range shift indicates change in species composition at the alpine and subalpine ecosystems in the Korean Peninsula.
| S-EPMC4532508 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Incomplete sampling of species' geographic distributions has challenged biogeographers for many years to precisely quantify global-scale biodiversity patterns. After correcting for the spatial inequality of sample completeness, we generated a global species diversity map for woody angiosperms (82,974 species, 13,959,780 occurrence records). The standardized diversity estimated more pronounced latitudinal and longitudinal diversity gradients than the raw data and improved the spatial prediction of diversity based on environmental factors. We identified areas with potentially high species richness and rarity that are poorly explored, unprotected, and threatened by increasing human pressure: They are distributed mostly at low latitudes across central South America, Central Africa, subtropical China, and Indomalayan islands. These priority areas for botanical exploration can help to efficiently fill spatial knowledge gaps for better describing the status of biodiversity and improve the effectiveness of the protected area network for global woody plant conservation.
| S-EPMC10558125 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Ecosystem functioning is largely dependent on the functional traits of its component species. Most of the previous researches on ecosystem recovery have mainly focused on taxonomic composition but less attention is concentrated on functional community composition. Here, we examine the dynamic trend of functional community composition along a recovery chronosequence following clear cutting in subtropical evergreen-deciduous broadleaved mixed forest. Results showed that with the process of recovery, the functional composition changed from a community with high specific leaf area (CWM_ SLA), leaf nitrogen concentration (CWM_ LNC) and leaf phosphorus (CWM_ LPC) but low leaf thickness (CWM_ LT) and stem tissue density (CWM_ STD) to that with low CWM_ SLA, CWM_ LNC and CWM_ LPC but high CWM_ LT and CWM_ STD. Functional traits of evergreen and deciduous species were significantly different in each stage. Light availability and soil phosphorus were the most important influencing factors during the recovery. Our study suggests that the subtropical evergreen-deciduous broadleaved mixed forest is gradually shifting from a resource acquisitive to a resource conservative assemblage, in which evergreen species will become more and more dominant. Any management or conservation planning upon the forest ecosystem should integrate this dynamic trend of functional change.
| S-EPMC6220334 | biostudies-literature
Project description:BACKGROUND:Climatic changes during glacial periods have had a major influence on the recent evolutionary history of living organisms, even in temperate forests on islands, where the land was not covered with ice sheets. We investigated the phylogeographical patterns of the weevil Curculio sikkimensis (Curculionidae), a generalist seed predator of Fagaceae plants living in both deciduous oak and evergreen forests of Japan. Its genetic structure was compared to that of another host-specific seed predator, C. hilgendorfi, inhabiting only evergreen forests. RESULTS:We examined 921 bp of mitochondrial DNA for 115 individuals collected from 33 populations of C. sikkimensis from 11 plant species of three genera, Quercus, Lithocarpus, and Castanopsis. An analysis of molecular variance revealed that a large proportion (almost 50%, P < 0.001) of the total genetic variance could be explained by differences between two geographical regions, the southwestern and northeastern parts of the main islands of Japan. In contrast, no significant genetic differentiation of the weevil was observed among vegetation types of their utilized host plant species. The phylogeographical patterns of the generalist and the host-specific seed predator exhibited a congruent genetic boundary in the Chugoku-Shikoku region. CONCLUSION:Our results suggest that geology and historical environment have contributed to shaping the present genetic structure of C. sikkimensis. The geographical patterns of genetic differentiation in the Chugoku-Shikoku region observed in the two types of Fagaceae-associated Curculio in this study have also been observed in several plant species growing in warm and cool temperate zones of Japan. The occurrence of this common pattern suggests that deciduous oak and evergreen forests of Japan survived together, or adjacent to each other, in small refugia during glacial ages, in the southwestern and northeastern parts of the main islands, although these two types of forests are presently distributed in cool and warm temperate zones of Japan, respectively.
| S-EPMC2691738 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Bamboo (Phyllostachys pubescens) expansion into adjacent forests is a widespread phenomenon in subtropical regions, and it has greatly changed the dominance hierarchy from trees to bamboos. This process may be accompanied by changes in productivity, nutrients accumulation and biogeochemical cycles. We compared the net primary production (NPP) and major pools and fluxes of nitrogen (N) in bamboo-dominant forest (BDF) and neighboring secondary evergreen broadleaved forest (EBF) in South China using the space-for-time substitution method. We found that the mean NPP of the BDF was 30.0 t ha-1 yr-1, which was 51.5% greater than that of the EBF (19.8 t ha-1 yr-1). The plant N pool for the BDF was 37.5% larger than that of the EBF, whereas the soil inorganic N pool significantly decreased by 31.2% with conversion of the EBF to BDF. Additionally, the ratio of N return to N uptake was 0.69 in the BDF and 0.88 in the EBF because of the lower litter N return of the BDF compared with that of the EBF. These results indicated that the expansion of P. pubescens significantly increased the NPP and plant N accumulation but reduced the soil N available pool and slowed the N cycling rate, which could lead to soil degradation.
| S-EPMC5220298 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Relationships among productivity, leaf phenology, and seasonal variation in moisture and light availability are poorly understood for evergreen broadleaved tropical/subtropical forests, which contribute 25% of terrestrial productivity. On the one hand, as moisture availability declines, trees shed leaves to reduce transpiration and the risk of hydraulic failure. On the other hand, increases in light availability promote the replacement of senescent leaves to increase productivity. Here, we provide a comprehensive framework that relates the seasonality of climate, leaf abscission, and leaf productivity across the evergreen broadleaved tropical/subtropical forest biome. The seasonal correlation between rainfall and light availability varies from strongly negative to strongly positive across the tropics and maps onto the seasonal correlation between litterfall mass and productivity for 68 forests. Where rainfall and light covary positively, litterfall and productivity also covary positively and are always greater in the wetter sunnier season. Where rainfall and light covary negatively, litterfall and productivity are always greater in the drier and sunnier season if moisture supplies remain adequate; otherwise productivity is smaller in the drier sunnier season. This framework will improve the representation of tropical/subtropical forests in Earth system models and suggests how phenology and productivity will change as climate change alters the seasonality of cloud cover and rainfall across tropical/subtropical forests.
| S-EPMC8640595 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Previous studies have shown that the world's largest reptile - the leatherback turtle Dermochelys coriacea - conducts flexible foraging migrations that can cover thousands of kilometres between nesting sites and distant foraging areas. The vast distances that may be travelled by migrating leatherback turtles have greatly complicated conservation efforts for this species worldwide. However, we demonstrate, using a combination of satellite telemetry and stable isotope analysis, that approximately half of the nesting leatherbacks from an important rookery in South Africa do not migrate to distant foraging areas, but rather, forage in the coastal waters of the nearby Mozambique Channel. Moreover, this coastal cohort appears to remain resident year-round in shallow waters (<50?m depth) in a relatively fixed area. Stable isotope analyses further indicate that the Mozambique Channel also hosts large numbers of loggerhead turtles Caretta caretta. The rare presence of a resident coastal aggregation of leatherback turtles not only presents a unique opportunity for conservation, but alongside the presence of loggerhead turtles and other endangered marine megafauna in the Mozambique Channel, highlights the importance of this area as a marine biodiversity hotspot.
| S-EPMC5122952 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Understanding how environmental change alters the composition of plant assemblages is a major challenge in the face of global climate change. Researches accounting for site-specific trait values within forest communities help bridge plant economics theory and functional biogeography to better evaluate and predict relationships between environment and ecosystem functioning. Here, by measuring six functional traits (specific leaf area, leaf dry matter content, leaf nitrogen, and phosphorus concentration, leaf nitrogen/phosphorus, wood density) for 292 woody plant species (48,680 individuals) from 250 established permanent forest dynamics plots in five locations across the subtropical evergreen broadleaved forests (SEBLF) in China, we quantified functional compositions of communities by calculating four trait moments, i.e., community-weighted mean, variance, skewness, and kurtosis. The geographical (latitudinal, longitudinal, and elevational) patterns of functional trait moments and their environmental drivers were examined. Results showed that functional trait moments shifted significantly along the geographical gradients, and trait moments varied in different ways across different gradients. Plants generally showed coordinated trait shifts toward more conservative growth strategies (lower specific leaf area, leaf N and P concentration while higher leaf nitrogen/phosphorus and wood density) along increasing latitude and longitude. However, trends opposite to the latitudinal and longitudinal patterns appeared in trait mean values along elevation. The three sets of environmental variables (climate, soil and topography) explained 35.0-69.0%, 21.0-56.0%, 14.0-31.0%, and 16.0-30.0% of the variations in mean, variance, skewness, and kurtosis across the six functional traits, respectively. Patterns of shifts in functional trait moments along geographical gradients in the subtropical region were mainly determined by the joint effects of climatic and edaphic conditions. Climate regimes, especially climate variability, were the strongest driving force, followed by soil nutrients, while topography played the least role. Moreover, the relationship of variance, skewness and kurtosis with climate and their geographical patterns suggested that rare phenotypes at edges of trait space were selected in harsher environments. Our study suggested that environmental filtering (especially climate variability) was the dominant process of functional assembly for forest communities in the subtropical region along geographical gradients.
| S-EPMC8311185 | biostudies-literature
Project description:Ammopiptanthus mongolicus is a tertiary relict evergreen broad-leaf shrub in family Fabaceae with remarkable tolerance to desiccation and low temperature. In this study, we report the complete mitochondrial genome of A. mongolicus. The total genome length was 475,396?bp and contained a total of 127 genes, including 79 protein-coding genes (28 novel genes, 45 known functional genes, and six known orf genes), three rRNA genes, and 45 tRNA genes. Most of the genes were single-copy genes, only six were duplicated and two were multi-copy. The mitochondrial genome also contained 'promiscuous' sequences from the chloroplast, 16 intact tRNAs of mitochondrial origin, and 29 intact and potentially functional chloroplast-derived tRNAs. The overall GC content of the mitochondrial DNA was 42.75%. A neighbour-joining phylogenomic analysis showed that A. mongolicus was closely related to Medicago truncatula, which also belongs to family Leguminosae.
| S-EPMC7800826 | biostudies-literature
Project description:The generality of scaling relationships between multiple shoot traits, known as Corner's rules, has been considered to reflect the biomechanical limits to trees and tree organs among the species of different leaf sizes. Variation in fruit size within species would also be expected to affect shoot structure by changing the mechanical and hydraulic stresses caused by the mass and water requirement of fruits. We investigated the differences in shoot structure and their relationship with fruit size in Camellia japonica from 12 sites in a wide geographic range in Japan. This species is known to produce larger fruits with thicker pericarps in more southern populations because warmer climates induce more intensive arms race between the fruit size and the rostrum length of its obligate seed predator. We found that, in association with the change in fruit size, the diameter and mass of 1-year-old stems were negatively associated with latitude, but the total mass and area of 1-year-old leaves did not change with latitude. Consequently, the length of 1-year-old stems and the total mass and area of 1-year-old leaves at a given stem diameter were positively associated with latitude in the allometric relationships. In contrast, the allometric relationships between stem diameter and total mass of the 1-year-old shoot complex (the leaves, stems and fruits that were supported by a 1-year-old stem) did not differ across the trees of different latitudes. Thus, natural selection on fruit size is considered to influence the other traits of Corner's rules in C. japonica, but all of the traits of Corner's rules do not necessarily change in a similar manner across latitudinal gradients.
| S-EPMC8237846 | biostudies-literature