Global convergence in the vulnerability of forests to drought (original) (raw)

References

  1. Allen, C. D. et al. A global overview of drought and heat-induced tree mortality reveals emerging climate change risks for forests. For. Ecol. Manage. 259, 660–684 (2010)
    Article Google Scholar
  2. Brodribb, T. J. & Cochard, H. Hydraulic failure defines the recovery and point of death in water-stressed conifers. Plant Physiol. 149, 575–584 (2009)
    Article CAS PubMed PubMed Central Google Scholar
  3. Kursar, T. A. et al. Tolerance to low leaf water status of tropical tree seedlings is related to drought performance and distribution. Funct. Ecol. 23, 93–102 (2009)
    Article Google Scholar
  4. McDowell, N. et al. Mechanisms of plant survival and mortality during drought: why do some plants survive while others succumb to drought? New Phytol. 178, 719–739 (2008)
    Article PubMed Google Scholar
  5. Allison, I. et al. The Copenhagen Diagnosis: Updating the World on the Latest Climate Science (Elsevier, 2009)
  6. Zhang, X. et al. Detection of human influence on twentieth-century precipitation trends. Nature 448, 461–465 (2007)
    Article ADS CAS PubMed Google Scholar
  7. Meir, P. & Woodward, F. I. Amazonian rain forests and drought: response and vulnerability. New Phytol. 187, 553–557 (2010)
    Article PubMed Google Scholar
  8. Phillips, O. L. et al. Drought sensitivity of the amazon rainforest. Science 323, 1344–1347 (2009)
    Article ADS CAS PubMed Google Scholar
  9. Engelbrecht, B. M. J. et al. Drought sensitivity shapes species distribution patterns in tropical forests. Nature 447, 80–82 (2007)
    Article ADS CAS PubMed Google Scholar
  10. Pockman, W. T. & Sperry, J. S. Vulnerability to xylem cavitation and the distribution of Sonoran desert vegetation. Am. J. Bot. 87, 1287–1299 (2000)
    Article CAS PubMed Google Scholar
  11. McDowell, N. G. et al. The interdependence of mechanisms underlying climate-driven vegetation mortality. Trends Ecol. Evol. 26, 523–532 (2011)
    Article PubMed Google Scholar
  12. Anderegg, W. R. L. et al. The roles of hydraulic and carbon stress in a widespread climate-induced forest die-off. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 109, 233–237 (2012)
    Article ADS CAS PubMed Google Scholar
  13. Breshears, D. D. et al. Regional vegetation die-off in response to global-change-type drought. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 102, 15144–15148 (2005)
    Article ADS CAS PubMed PubMed Central Google Scholar
  14. Zhao, M. & Running, S. W. Drought-induced reduction in global terrestrial net primary production from 2000 through 2009. Science 329, 940–943 (2010)
    Article ADS CAS PubMed Google Scholar
  15. Lewis, S. L. Tropical forests and the changing earth system. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. B 361, 195–210 (2006)
    Article PubMed Google Scholar
  16. Pockman, W. T., Sperry, J. S. & O’Leary, J. W. Sustained and significant negative water pressure in xylem. Nature 378, 715–716 (1995)
    Article ADS CAS Google Scholar
  17. Tyree, M. T. & Sperry, J. S. Vulnerability of xylem to cavitation and embolism. Annu. Rev. Plant Phys. Mol. Bio. 40, 19–38 (1989)
    Article Google Scholar
  18. Sperry, J. S., Hacke, U. G. & Pittermann, J. Size and function in conifer tracheids and angiosperm vessels. Am. J. Bot. 93, 1490–1500 (2006)
    Article PubMed Google Scholar
  19. Maherali, H., Pockman, W. T. & Jackson, R. B. Adaptive variation in the vulnerability of woody plants to xylem cavitation. Ecology 85, 2184–2199 (2004)
    Article Google Scholar
  20. Delzon, S., Douthe, C., Sala, A. & Cochard, H. Mechanism of water-stress induced cavitation in conifers: bordered pit structure and function support the hypothesis of seal capillary-seeding. Plant Cell Environ. 33, 2101–2111 (2010)
    Article PubMed PubMed Central Google Scholar
  21. Sperry, J. S., Adler, F. R., Campbell, G. S. & Comstock, J. P. Limitation of plant water use by rhizosphere and xylem conductance: results from a model. Plant Cell Environ. 21, 347–359 (1998)
    Article Google Scholar
  22. Alder, N. N., Sperry, J. S. & Pockman, W. T. Root and stem xylem embolism, stomatal conductance, and leaf turgor in Acer grandidentatum populations along a soil moisture gradient. Oecologia 105, 293–301 (1996)
    Article ADS CAS PubMed Google Scholar
  23. Meinzer, F. C., Johnson, D. M., Lachenbruch, B., McCulloh, K. A. & Woodruff, D. R. Xylem hydraulic safety margins in woody plants: coordination of stomatal control of xylem tension with hydraulic capacitance. Funct. Ecol. 23, 922–930 (2009)
    Article Google Scholar
  24. Brodersen, C. R., McElrone, A. J., Choat, B., Matthews, M. A. & Shackel, K. A. The dynamics of embolism repair in xylem: in vivo visualizations using high-resolution computed tomography. Plant Physiol. 154, 1088–1095 (2010)
    Article CAS PubMed PubMed Central Google Scholar
  25. Brodribb, T. J., Bowman, D. J. M. S., Nichols, S., Delzon, S. & Burlett, R. Xylem function and growth rate interact to determine recovery rates after exposure to extreme water deficit. New Phytol. 188, 533–542 (2010)
    Article PubMed Google Scholar
  26. Martínez-Vilalta, J., Sala, A. & Piñol, J. The hydraulic architecture of Pinaceae—a review. Plant Ecol. 171, 3–13 (2004)
    Article Google Scholar
  27. Choat, B., Ball, M. C., Luly, J. G. & Holtum, J. A. M. Hydraulic architecture of deciduous and evergreen dry rainforest tree species from north-eastern Australia. Trees 19, 305–311 (2005)
    Article Google Scholar
  28. Scholz, F. G., Phillips, N. G., Bucci, S. J., Meinzer, F. C. & Goldstein, G. in Size- and Age-Related Changes in Tree Structure and Function Vol. 4 (eds Meinzer, F. C. et al.). 341–361 (Springer, 2011)
  29. Lamy, J. B. et al. Uniform selection as a primary force reducing population genetic differentiation of cavitation resistance across a species range. PLoS ONE 6, e23476 (2011)
    Article ADS CAS PubMed PubMed Central Google Scholar
  30. Wortemann, R. et al. Genotypic variability and phenotypic plasticity of cavitation resistance in Fagus sylvatica L. across Europe. Tree Physiol. 31, 1175–1182 (2011)
    Article PubMed Google Scholar

Download references

Acknowledgements

We thank the ARC-NZ Vegetation Function Network for hosting the original working group from which the data set was compiled. We are grateful to the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation for supporting B.C. during preparation of the manuscript.

Author information

Author notes

  1. Brendan Choat and Steven Jansen: These authors contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Western Sydney, Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment, Richmond, New South Wales 2753, Australia,
    Brendan Choat
  2. Ulm University, Institute for Systematic Botany and Ecology, Albert-Einstein-Allee 11, 89081 Ulm, Germany,
    Steven Jansen
  3. University of Tasmania, School of Plant Science, Private Bag 55, Hobart, Tasmania 7001, Australia,
    Tim J. Brodribb
  4. INRA, UMR547 PIAF, F-63100 Clermont-Ferrand, France,
    Hervé Cochard
  5. Clermont Université, Université Blaise Pascal, UMR547 PIAF, F-63000 Clermont-Ferrand, France,
    Hervé Cochard
  6. INRA, University of Bordeaux, UMR BIOGECO, 33450 Talence, France,
    Sylvain Delzon
  7. Brown University, Environmental Change Initiative, Box 1951, 167 Thayer Street, Providence, Rhode Island 02912, USA,
    Radika Bhaskar
  8. Departmento de Biología, Universidad Nacional de la Patagonia San Juan Bosco, Facultad de Ciencias Naturales, 9000 Comodoro Rivadavia, Argentina,
    Sandra J. Bucci
  9. James Cook University, School of Marine and Tropical Biology, Townsville, 4811, Queensland, Australia
    Taylor S. Feild
  10. Department of Biological Sciences, Macquarie University, New South Wales 2109, Australia,
    Sean M. Gleason, Mark Westoby & Ian J. Wright
  11. Department of Renewable Resources, University of Alberta, Edmonton, Alberta T6G 2E3, Canada,
    Uwe G. Hacke
  12. Department of Biology, California State University, Bakersfield, 93311, California, USA
    Anna L. Jacobsen & R. Brandon Pratt
  13. Naturalis Biodiversity Centre, Leiden University, PO Box 9514, 2300 RA Leiden, The Netherlands,
    Frederic Lens
  14. Department of Integrative Biology, University of Guelph, 50 Stone Road East, Guelph, Ontario N1G 2W1, Canada,
    Hafiz Maherali
  15. CREAF, Cerdanyola del Vallès 08193, Spain,
    Jordi Martínez-Vilalta
  16. Universitat Autònoma Barcelona, Cerdanyola del Vallès 08193, Spain,
    Jordi Martínez-Vilalta
  17. University Innsbruck, Institut für Botank, Sternwartestrasse 15, A-6020 Innsbruck, Austria,
    Stefan Mayr
  18. ICREA at CREAF, Univ Autònoma Barcelona, Cerdanyola del Vallès 08193, Spain,
    Maurizio Mencuccini
  19. University of Edinburgh, School of GeoSciences, Crew Building, West Mains Road, Edinburgh EH9 3JN, UK,
    Maurizio Mencuccini
  20. CSIRO, Ecosystem Sciences, College Road, Sandy Bay, Tasmania 7005, Australia,
    Patrick J. Mitchell
  21. Dipartimento di Scienze della Vita, Università di Trieste, Via L. Giorgieri 10, 34127 Trieste, Italy,
    Andrea Nardini
  22. Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology, University of California, Santa Cruz, 95064, California, USA
    Jarmila Pittermann
  23. Department of Biology, University of Utah, 257 South 1400 East, Salt Lake City, Utah 84112, USA,
    John S. Sperry
  24. Missouri Botanical Garden, Center for Conservation and Sustainable Development, St. Louis, 63166, Missouri, USA
    Amy E. Zanne
  25. Department of Biological Sciences, George Washington University, 2023 G Street NW, 20052, Washington DC, USA
    Amy E. Zanne

Authors

  1. Brendan Choat
  2. Steven Jansen
  3. Tim J. Brodribb
  4. Hervé Cochard
  5. Sylvain Delzon
  6. Radika Bhaskar
  7. Sandra J. Bucci
  8. Taylor S. Feild
  9. Sean M. Gleason
  10. Uwe G. Hacke
  11. Anna L. Jacobsen
  12. Frederic Lens
  13. Hafiz Maherali
  14. Jordi Martínez-Vilalta
  15. Stefan Mayr
  16. Maurizio Mencuccini
  17. Patrick J. Mitchell
  18. Andrea Nardini
  19. Jarmila Pittermann
  20. R. Brandon Pratt
  21. John S. Sperry
  22. Mark Westoby
  23. Ian J. Wright
  24. Amy E. Zanne

Contributions

B.C. and S.J. led the initial working group and coordinated the analysis and write-up of the work. B.C., S.J., T.J.B., H.C., S.D., R.B., S.J.B., T.S.F., S.M.G., U.G.H., A.L.J., F.L., H.M., J.M.-V., S.M., M.M., P.J.M., A.N., J.P., R.B.P., J.S.S., M.W., I.J.W. and A.E.Z. contributed to compilation and organization of the data set and writing of the manuscript. S.M.G. and I.J.W. extracted climate data from the WorldClim and CRU climate databases. H.M., M.M. and J.M.-V. assisted in statistical analyses of the data set.

Corresponding author

Correspondence toSteven Jansen.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing financial interests.

Supplementary information

Supplementary Information (download PDF )

This file contains Supplementary Figures 1 and 2 and additional references. (PDF 465 kb)

Supplementary Table 1 (download XLS )

This file contains the dataset compiled from published work and unpublished data of the authors, including species names, Ψ50, Ψ88, Ψmin, safety margins, climate data, life form, biome, site data, and the sources of published data.This file was corrected on 23 January 2013 to correct an error in the dataset. (XLS 192 kb)

PowerPoint slides

Rights and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Choat, B., Jansen, S., Brodribb, T. et al. Global convergence in the vulnerability of forests to drought.Nature 491, 752–755 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature11688

Download citation