The effects of warming-shifted plant phenology on ecosystem carbon exchange are regulated by precipitation in a semi-arid grassland

The longer growing season under climate warming has served as a crucial mechanism for the enhancement of terrestrial carbon (C) sink over the past decades. A better understanding of this mechanism is critical for projection of changes in C cycling of terrestrial ecosystems. A 4-year field experiment...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2012-02, Vol.7 (2), p.e32088
Main Authors: Xia, Jianyang, Wan, Shiqiang
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Aridity
Biology
Biometeorology
Carbon Cycle
Carbon dioxide
Carbon exchange
Carbon sequestration
Climate
Climate Change
Coverage
Cycles
Earth Sciences
Ecosystem
Ecosystem assessment
Ecosystem biology
Environmental changes
Fluxes
Global warming
Grasslands
Growing season
Influence
Laboratories
Night
Phenology
Photosynthesis
Plant growth
Plant phenology
Plant Physiological Phenomena
Plants (botany)
Plants - metabolism
Precipitation
Precipitation (Meteorology)
Precipitation patterns
Rain
Rainfall
Respiration
Seasons
Senescence
Species
Studies
Terrestrial ecosystems
Terrestrial environments
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Summary:The longer growing season under climate warming has served as a crucial mechanism for the enhancement of terrestrial carbon (C) sink over the past decades. A better understanding of this mechanism is critical for projection of changes in C cycling of terrestrial ecosystems. A 4-year field experiment with day and night warming was conducted to examine the responses of plant phenology and their influences on plant coverage and ecosystem C cycling in a temperate steppe in northern China. Greater phenological responses were observed under night than day warming. Both day and night warming prolonged the growing season by advancing phenology of early-blooming species but without changing that of late-blooming species. However, no warming response of vegetation coverage was found for any of the eight species. The variances in species-level coverage and ecosystem C fluxes under different treatments were positively dependent upon the accumulated precipitation within phenological duration but not the length of phenological duration. These plants' phenology is more sensitive to night than day warming, and the warming effects on ecosystem C exchange via shifting plant phenology could be mediated by precipitation patterns in semi-arid grasslands.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0032088