Journal article
Basin-wide variation in tree hydraulic safety margins predicts the carbon balance of Amazon forests
- Abstract:
- ests face increasing climate risk, yet our ability to predict their response to climate change is limited by poor understanding of their resistance to water stress. Although xylem embolism resistance thresholds (for example, Ψ50) and hydraulic safety margins (for example, HSM50) are important predictors of drought-induced mortality risk, little is known about how these vary across Earth’s largest tropical forest. Here, we present a pan-Amazon, fully standardized hydraulic traits dataset and use it to assess regional variation in drought sensitivity and hydraulic trait ability to predict species distributions and long-term forest biomass accumulation. Parameters Ψ50 and HSM50 vary markedly across the Amazon and are related to average long-term rainfall characteristics. Both Ψ50 and HSM50 influence the biogeographical distribution of Amazon tree species. However, HSM50 was the only significant predictor of observed decadal-scale changes in forest biomass. Old-growth forests with wide HSM50 are gaining more biomass than are low HSM50 forests. We propose that this may be associated with a growth–mortality trade-off whereby trees in forests consisting of fast-growing species take greater hydraulic risks and face greater mortality risk. Moreover, in regions of more pronounced climatic change, we find evidence that forests are losing biomass, suggesting that species in these regions may be operating beyond their hydraulic limits. Continued climate change is likely to further reduce HSM50 in the Amazon, with strong implications for the Amazon carbon sink.
- Publication status:
- Published
- Peer review status:
- Peer reviewed
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- Files:
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(Preview, Version of record, pdf, 15.2MB, Terms of use)
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- Publisher copy:
- 10.1038/s41586-023-05971-3
Authors
- Publisher:
- Springer Nature
- Journal:
- Nature More from this journal
- Volume:
- 617
- Issue:
- 7959
- Pages:
- 111-117
- Place of publication:
- England
- Publication date:
- 2023-04-26
- Acceptance date:
- 2023-03-17
- DOI:
- EISSN:
-
1476-4687
- ISSN:
-
0028-0836
- Pmid:
-
37100901
- Language:
-
English
- Keywords:
- Pubs id:
-
1339592
- Local pid:
-
pubs:1339592
- Deposit date:
-
2023-10-31
Terms of use
- Copyright holder:
- Tavares et al.
- Copyright date:
- 2023
- Rights statement:
- © The Author(s) 2023. Open Access: This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder.
- Licence:
- CC Attribution (CC BY)
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