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Homeostasis of tropical forest carbohydrates

Fig 1. Homeostasis of canopy tree leaf carbohydrates with a) acute drought progression and b) long-term precipitation variation.

Dickman, L.T. et al. 2018. Homeostatic maintenance of non-structural carbohydrates during the 2015-2016 El Niño drought across a tropical forest precipitation gradient. Plant, Cell & Environment. https://doi.org/10.1111/pce.13501.

Through the most exhaustive tropical forest carbohydrate sampling and analysis done to date, we found that canopy tree carbohydrate concentrations are insensitive to both seasonal drought and long-term climate (Fig. 1). We also identified easily measured traits that may be predictive of carbohydrate concentrations (Fig. 2).

These findings help to unify our understanding of forest carbohydrate dynamics across the few existing tropical datasets. Since carbohydrates play an important role in forest survival, this may improve our ability to simulate vegetation dynamics in Earth System Models and simplify model benchmarking.

Sampled leaf and branch tissues from 23 canopy species at three sites across a precipitation transect in the tropical forests of Panama over the course of the 2016 El Niño drought

Tested response of carbohydrates to acute drought (across month) and long-term precipitation variation (across site)

Tested for relationships to a suite of traits measured in concert during four monthly 2016 El Niño campaigns

Fig 2. Canopy tree leaf carbohydrates are positively related to leaf mass per area, an easily and ubiquitously measured leaf trait.

Leaf Total NSC (%DW)

B.

Site

dry

med

Month

Feb

Mar

Apr

May

0

2

4

6

8

A.

wet