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Yadvinder Malhi

Publications and source records attributed to Yadvinder Malhi.

9 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2005

The interacting effects of elevated atmospheric CO2 concentration, drought and leaf-to-air vapour pressure deficit on ecosystem isoprene fluxes.

Isoprene is the most abundant biogenic hydrocarbon released from vegetation and it plays a major role in tropospheric chemistry. Because of its link to climate change, there is interest in understanding the relationship between CO2, water availability and isoprene emission. We explored the effect of atmospheric elevated CO2 concentration and its interaction with vapour pressure deficit (VPD) and water stress, on gross isoprene production (GIP) and net ecosystem exchange of CO2 (NEE) in two Populus deltoides plantations grown at ambient and elevated atmospheric CO2 concentration in the Biosphere 2 Laboratory facility. Although GIP and NEE showed a similar response to light and temperature, their responses to CO2 and VPD were opposite; NEE was stimulated by elevated CO2 and depressed by high VPD, while GIP was inhibited by elevated CO2 and stimulated by high VPD. The difference in response between isoprene production and photosynthesis was also evident during water stress. GIP was stimulated in the short term and declined only when the stress was severe, whereas NEE started to decrease from the beginning of the experiment. This contrasting response led the carbon lost as isoprene in both the ambient and the elevated CO2 treatments to increase as water stress progressed. Our results suggest that water limitation can override the inhibitory effect of elevated CO2 leading to increased global isoprene emissions in a climate change scenario with warmer and drier climate.

Atmosphere↗
PubMed2004

Increasing biomass in Amazonian forest plots.

A previous study by Phillips et al. of changes in the biomass of permanent sample plots in Amazonian forests was used to infer the presence of a regional carbon sink. However, these results generated a vigorous debate about sampling and methodological issues. Therefore we present a new analysis of biomass change in old-growth Amazonian forest plots using updated inventory data. We find that across 59 sites, the above-ground dry biomass in trees that are more than 10 cm in diameter (AGB) has increased since plot establishment by 1.22 +/- 0.43 Mg per hectare per year (ha(-1) yr(-1), where 1 ha = 10(4) m2), or 0.98 +/- 0.38 Mg ha(-1) yr(-1) if individual plot values are weighted by the number of hectare years of monitoring. This significant increase is neither confounded by spatial or temporal variation in wood specific gravity, nor dependent on the allometric equation used to estimate AGB. The conclusion is also robust to uncertainty about diameter measurements for problematic trees: for 34 plots in western Amazon forests a significant increase in AGB is found even with a conservative assumption of zero growth for all trees where diameter measurements were made using optical methods and/or growth rates needed to be estimated following fieldwork. Overall, our results suggest a slightly greater rate of net stand-level change than was reported by Phillips et al. Considering the spatial and temporal scale of sampling and associated studies showing increases in forest growth and stem turnover, the results presented here suggest that the total biomass of these plots has on average increased and that there has been a regional-scale carbon sink in old-growth Amazonian forests during the previous two decades.

Biomass↗
PubMed2004

Fingerprinting the impacts of global change on tropical forests.

Recent observations of widespread changes in mature tropical forests such as increasing tree growth, recruitment and mortality rates and increasing above-ground biomass suggest that 'global change' agents may be causing predictable changes in tropical forests. However, consensus over both the robustness of these changes and the environmental drivers that may be causing them is yet to emerge. This paper focuses on the second part of this debate. We review (i) the evidence that the physical, chemical and biological environment that tropical trees grow in has been altered over recent decades across large areas of the tropics, and (ii) the theoretical, experimental and observational evidence regarding the most likely effects of each of these changes on tropical forests. Ten potential widespread drivers of environmental change were identified: temperature, precipitation, solar radiation, climatic extremes (including El Niño-Southern Oscillation events), atmospheric CO2 concentrations, nutrient deposition, O3/acid depositions, hunting, land-use change and increasing liana numbers. We note that each of these environmental changes is expected to leave a unique 'fingerprint' in tropical forests, as drivers directly force different processes, have different distributions in space and time and may affect some forests more than others (e.g. depending on soil fertility). Thus, in the third part of the paper we present testable a priori predictions of forest responses to assist ecologists in attributing particular changes in forests to particular causes across multiple datasets. Finally, we discuss how these drivers may change in the future and the possible consequences for tropical forests.

Atmosphere↗
PubMed2004

Spatial patterns and recent trends in the climate of tropical rainforest regions.

We present an analysis of the mean climate and climatic trends of tropical rainforest regions over the period 1960-1998, with the aid of explicit maps of forest cover and climatological databases. Until the mid-1970s most regions showed little trend in temperature, and the western Amazon experienced a net cooling probably associated with an interdecadal oscillation. Since the mid-1970s, all tropical rainforest regions have experienced a strong warming at a mean rate of 0.26 +/- 0.05 degrees C per decade, in synchrony with a global rise in temperature that has been attributed to the anthropogenic greenhouse effect. Over the study period, precipitation appears to have declined in tropical rainforest regions at a rate of 1.0 +/- 0.8% per decade (p < 5%), declining sharply in northern tropical Africa (at 3-4% per decade), declining marginally in tropical Asia and showing no significant trend in Amazonia. There is no evidence so far of a decline in precipitation in eastern Amazonia, a region thought vulnerable to climate-change-induced drying. The strong drying trend in Africa suggests that this should be a priority study region for understanding the impact of drought on tropical rainforests. We develop and use a dry-season index to study variations in the length and intensity of the dry season. Only African and Indian tropical rainforests appear to have seen a significant increase in dry-season intensity. In terms of interannual variability, the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) is the primary driver of temperature variations across the tropics and of precipitation fluctuations for large areas of the Americas and southeast Asia. The relation between ENSO and tropical African precipitation appears less direct.

Geography↗
PubMed2004

Tropical forests and global atmospheric change: a synthesis.

We present a personal perspective on the highlights of the Theme Issue 'Tropical forests and global atmospheric change'. We highlight the key findings on the contemporary rate of climatic change in the tropics, the evidence-gained from field studies-of large-scale and rapid change in the dynamics and biomass of old-growth forests, and evidence of how climate change and fragmentation can interact to increase the vulnerability of plants and animals to fires. A range of opinions exists concerning the possible cause of these observed changes, but examination of the spatial 'fingerprint' of observed change may help to identify the driving mechanism(s). Studies of changes in tropical forest regions since the last glacial maximum show the sensitivity of species composition and ecology to atmospheric changes. Model studies of change in forest vegetation highlight the potential importance of temperature or drought thresholds that could lead to substantial forest decline in the near future. During the coming century, the Earth's remaining tropical forests face the combined pressures of direct human impacts and a climatic and atmospheric situation not experienced for at least 20 million years. Understanding and monitoring of their response to this atmospheric change are essential if we are to maximize their conservation options.

Atmosphere↗
PubMed2002

Carbon in the atmosphere and terrestrial biosphere in the 21st century.

The release of carbon dioxide from fossil-fuel combustion and land-use change has caused a significant perturbation in the natural cycling of carbon between land, atmosphere and oceans. Understanding and managing the effects of this disruption on atmospheric composition and global climate are likely to be amongst the most pressing issues of the 21st century. However, the present-day carbon cycle is still poorly understood. One remarkable feature is that an increasing amount of atmospheric carbon dioxide appears to be being absorbed by terrestrial vegetation. I review the recent evidence for the magnitude and spatial distribution of this 'terrestrial carbon sink', drawing on current research on the global atmospheric distribution and transport of carbon dioxide, oxygen and their isotopes; direct measurement of CO(2) fluxes above various biomes; and inventories of forest biomass and composition. I review the likely causes of these carbon sinks and sources and their implications for the ecology and stability of these biomes. Finally, I examine prospects and key issues over coming decades. Within a few years, satellite measurements of atmospheric CO(2) and forest biomass, coupled with 'real-time' biosphere-atmosphere models, will revolutionize our understanding of the terrestrial carbon cycle. Controlling deforestation and managing forests has the potential to play a significant but limited part in reaching the goal of stabilizing atmospheric CO(2) concentrations. However, there are likely to be limits to the amount of carbon storage possible in natural vegetation, and, in the long term, terrestrial carbon storage may be unstable, with the potential to accelerate rather than brake global warming.

Atmosphere↗
PubMed2002

Increasing dominance of large lianas in Amazonian forests.

Ecological orthodoxy suggests that old-growth forests should be close to dynamic equilibrium, but this view has been challenged by recent findings that neotropical forests are accumulating carbon and biomass, possibly in response to the increasing atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide. However, it is unclear whether the recent increase in tree biomass has been accompanied by a shift in community composition. Such changes could reduce or enhance the carbon storage potential of old-growth forests in the long term. Here we show that non-fragmented Amazon forests are experiencing a concerted increase in the density, basal area and mean size of woody climbing plants (lianas). Over the last two decades of the twentieth century the dominance of large lianas relative to trees has increased by 1.7-4.6% a year. Lianas enhance tree mortality and suppress tree growth, so their rapid increase implies that the tropical terrestrial carbon sink may shut down sooner than current models suggest. Predictions of future tropical carbon fluxes will need to account for the changing composition and dynamics of supposedly undisturbed forests.

Analysis of Variance↗
PubMed2002

Forests, carbon and global climate.

This review places into context the role that forest ecosystems play in the global carbon cycle, and their potential interactions with climate change. We first examine the natural, preindustrial carbon cycle. Every year forest gross photosynthesis cycles approximately one-twelfth of the atmospheric stock of carbon dioxide, accounting for 50% of terrestrial photosynthesis. This cycling has remained almost constant since the end of the last ice age, but since the Industrial Revolution it has undergone substantial disruption as a result of the injection of 480 PgC into the atmosphere through fossil-fuel combustion and land-use change, including forest clearance. In the second part of this paper we review this 'carbon disruption', and its impact on the oceans, atmosphere and biosphere. Tropical deforestation is resulting in a release of 1.7 PgC yr(-1) into the atmosphere. However, there is also strong evidence for a 'sink' for carbon in natural vegetation (carbon absorption), which can be explained partly by the regrowth of forests on abandoned lands, and partly by a global change factor, the most likely cause being 'fertilization' resulting from the increase in atmospheric CO(2). In the 1990s this biosphere sink was estimated to be sequestering 3.2 PgC yr(-1) and is likely to have substantial effects on the dynamics, structure and biodiversity of all forests. Finally, we examine the potential for forest protection and afforestation to mitigate climate change. An extensive global carbon sequestration programme has the potential to make a particularly significant contribution to controlling the rise in CO2 emissions in the next few decades. In the course of the whole century, however, even the maximum amount of carbon that could be sequestered will be dwarfed by the magnitude of (projected) fossil-fuel emissions. Forest carbon sequestration should only be viewed as a component of a mitigation strategy, not as a substitute for the changes in energy supply, use and technology that will be required if atmospheric CO(2) concentrations are to be stabilized.

Air Pollution↗