At the global scale, the uptake of atmospheric carbon dioxide by terrestrial ecosystems through photosynthesis is commonly estimated through vegetation indices or biophysical properties derived from optical remote sensing data. Microwave observations of vegetated areas are sensitive to different components of the vegetation layer than observations in the optical domain […]
In trees, large uncertainties remain in how nonstructural carbohydrates (NSCs) respond to variation in water availability in natural, intact ecosystems. Variation in NSC pools reflects temporal fluctuations in supply and demand, as well as physiological coordination across tree organs in ways that differ across species and NSC fractions (e.g., soluble […]
Wired red oak is first of its kind in North America. As trees across the U.S. continue their picturesque march toward autumn, one 100-year-old oak tree in Massachusetts is attracting a crowd of admirers online. The tree is a scientific wonder—not because of its unique looks or a special way […]
Snow is important for local to global climate and surface hydrology, but spatial and temporal heterogeneity in the extent of snow cover make accurate, fine-scale mapping and monitoring of snow an enormous challenge. We took 184,453 daily near-surface images acquired by 133 automated cameras and processed them using crowdsourcing and […]
Longstanding land-management policies of complete wildfire suppression on wild lands were intended to prevent catastrophic wildfires through constant human monitoring and intervention. However, when combined with policies that prohibit logging or thinning in protected areas, total fire suppression can lead to giant conflagrations anyhow, as the buildup of fuel materials […]
Optimality theory states that whole-tree carbon gain is maximized when leaf N and photosynthetic capacity profiles are distributed along vertical light gradients such that the marginal gain of nitrogen investment is identical among leaves. However, observed photosynthetic N gradients in trees do not follow this prediction, and the causes for […]
Tree architecture is crucial to maximizing light capture, determined by carbon allocation of individual trees, and consequently characterizes species-specific growth strategies. Its variation and associated life-history strategies have been examined in tropical and temperate forests, but not in subtropical forests. Moreover, a similar architectural pattern was found using a hierarchical […]
Forest phenology is a multi-scale phenomenon, arising from processes in leaves and trees, with effects on the ecology of plant communities and landscapes. Because phenology controls carbon and water cycles, which are commonly observed at the ecosystem scale (e.g. eddy flux measurements), it is important to characterize the relation between […]
Crowther et al. Reported that the best predictor of surface soil carbon (top 10 cm) losses in response to warming is the size of the surface carbon stock in the soil (that is, carbon stocks in plots that have not been warmed), finding that soils that are high in soil carbon also […]
PREMISE OF THE STUDY: The aboveground tissues of plants host numerous, ecologically important fungi, yet patterns in the spatial distribution of these fungi remain little known. Forest canopies in particular are vast reservoirs of fungal diversity, but intracrown variation in fungal communities has rarely been explored. Knowledge of how fungi […]