Publications related to Climax community

Ecosystem engineering by periphyton in Alpine proglacial streams

Tom Ian Battin, Davide Mancini, Marc Aguet, Adrijan Selitaj, Matteo Roncoroni

Stream periphytons are candidate ecosystem engineers in proglacial margins. Here, we quantify the extent to which they are engineers for the case of hillslope-fed tributaries in the terrace zones of proglacial margin alluvial plains. Candidate ecosystem en ...

WILEY2023

Global Mapping of Potential and Climatic Plant‐Available Soil Water

Sara Bonetti, Dani Or

The estimation of plant-available soil water (PASW) is essential to quantify transpiration fluxes, the onset of heatwaves, irrigation water management, land-use decisions, vegetation ecology, and land surface memory in climate models. PASW is the amount of ...

2023

Both diversity and functional composition affect productivity and water use efficiency in experimental temperate grasslands

Charlotte Grossiord, Margaux Clara Lou Didion-Gency

Many experiments have shown that biodiversity promotes ecosystem functioning and stability and that this relationship varies with resource availability. However, we still have a poor understanding of the underlying physiological and ecological mechanisms d ...

WILEY2021

Shift in plant-soil interactions along a lakeshore hydrological gradient

Alexandre Buttler, Luca Bragazza, Mathieu Raymond Santonja, Wenjuan Feng

Wetlands occupy the transitional zone between aquatic and terrestrial systems. Hydrological conditions have significant influence on wetland plant communities and soil biogeochemistry. However, our knowledge about plant-soil interactions in wetlands along ...

ELSEVIER2020

Assessment of abundance and community composition of benthic macroinvertebrates: recommendations for improved sampling, fixation and extraction of oligochaetes

Benoît Jean Dominique Ferrari, Régis Lionel Vivien

For several decades, the abundance and community structure of benthic macroinvertebrates have been studied to assess the biological quality of aquatic ecosystems. Procedures aiming at studying the whole of macroinvertebrate communities were mainly designed ...

2020

Dispersal limitations and historical factors determine the biogeography of specialized terrestrial protists

Edward Mitchell, Luca Bragazza, Mariusz Lamentowicz, Enrique Lara, Bertrand Fournier

Recent studies show that soil eukaryotic diversity is immense and dominated by micro-organisms. However, it is unclear to what extent the processes that shape the distribution of diversity in plants and animals also apply to micro-organisms. Major diversif ...

WILEY2019

Signatures of selection and environmental adaptation across the goat genome post-domestication

Stéphane Joost, Estelle Rochat

Background: Since goat was domesticated 10,000 years ago, many factors have contributed to the differentiation of goat breeds and these are classified mainly into two types: (i) adaptation to different breeding systems and/or purposes and (ii) adaptation t ...

2018

A novel testate amoebae trait-based approach to infer environmental disturbance in Sphagnum peatlands

Vincent Eric Jules Jassey, Mariusz Lamentowicz

Species' functional traits are closely related to ecosystem processes through evolutionary adaptation, and are thus directly connected to environmental changes. Species' traits are not commonly used in palaeoecology, even though they offer powerful advanta ...

Nature Research2016

Experimental warming interacts with soil moisture to discriminate plant responses in an ombrotrophic peatland

Alexandre Buttler, Pierre Rémi Mariotte, Edward Mitchell, Luca Bragazza, Bjorn Jozef Maria Robroek, Vincent Eric Jules Jassey, Cédric Pochelon

QuestionA better understanding of the response of Sphagnum mosses and associated vascular plants to climate warming is relevant for predicting the carbon balance of peatlands in a warmer world. Open-top chambers (OTCs) have been used to investigate the eff ...

Wiley-Blackwell2015

Biotic and Abiotic Constraints on the Decomposition of Fagus sylvatica Leaf Litter Along an Altitudinal Gradient in Contrasting Land-Use Types

Alexandre Buttler, Konstantin Svetlozarov Gavazov, Thomas Spiegelberger, Robert Thomas Edmund Mills

Climate change can affect the process of carbon cycling and leaf litter decomposition in multiple ways, both directly and indirectly, though the strength and direction of this relationship is often context dependent. In this experiment, we followed decompo ...

Springer Verlag2014

Impact of management type and intensity on multiple facets of grassland biodiversity in the French Jura Mountains

François Gillet

Questions(1) Does grassland vegetation differ in its taxonomic, phylogenetic and functional alpha diversity between strictly grazed parcels (SGP) and mowed-and-grazed parcels (MGP)? (2) Do we observe differences in the responses of functional diversity (re ...

Wiley-Blackwell2014

Comparing integrated stable isotope and eddy covariance estimates of water-use efficiency on a Mediterranean successional sequence

Francesco Giuseppe Miglietta

Water-use efficiency (WUE), thought to be a relevant trait for productivity and adaptation to water-limited environments, was estimated for three different ecosystems on the Mediterranean island of Pianosa: Mediterranean macchia (S-MM), transition (S-TR) a ...

Springer Verlag2014

Alien plant species distribution in the European Alps: influence of species' climatic requirements

Luca Bragazza

The paper provides the first estimate of the role of abiotic and anthropogenic variables driving both alien plant species richness and composition covering the whole region of the European Alps. To establish and spread in a new area, alien plants must be a ...

Springer Verlag2014

Signs of critical transition in the Everglades wetlands in response to climate and anthropogenic changes

Andrea Rinaldo

The increasing pressure of climatic change and anthropogenic activities is predicted to have major effects on ecosystems around the world. With their fragility and sensitivity to hydrologic shifts and land-use changes, wetlands are among the most vulnerabl ...

National Academy of Sciences2013

Subordinate plant species enhance community resistance against drought in semi-natural grasslands

Alexandre Buttler, Pierre Rémi Mariotte, Charlotte Vandenberghe

According to the insurance hypothesis, more diverse plant communities are more likely to be resistant to drought. Whilst many experiments have been carried out to determine the effects of plant diversity on plant community insurance, the results are still ...

Wiley-Blackwell2013

Biotic plant-soil feedbacks across temporal scales

Pierre Rémi Mariotte

Plant effects on soil biota can result in feedbacks affecting plant performance, with consequences for plant community and ecosystem dynamics on short and long time-scales. In addition, the strength and direction of plant-soil feedbacks depend on tempor ...

Wiley-Blackwell2013

Analysis of carbon and nitrogen dynamics in riparian soils: Model development

David Andrew Barry, Alessandro Brovelli, Jordi Batlle-Aguilar

The quality of riparian soils and their ability to buffer contaminant releases to aquifers and streams are connected intimately to moisture content and nutrient dynamics, in particular of carbon (C) and nitrogen (N). A multi-compartment model – named the R ...

Elsevier2012

Effects of Subordinate Plant Species in Plant and Soil Community Structure and Ecosystem Functioning

Pierre Rémi Mariotte

The relevance of biodiversity to human health is an increasing international political issue as it causes concern for ethical and aesthetic reasons, but also has a strong impact on ecosystem properties and ecological goods and services utilised by humanity ...

EPFL2012

Mechanisms of vegetation uprooting by flow in alluvial non-cohesive sediment

Paolo Perona, Katharina Maria Edmaier

The establishment of riparian pioneer vegetation is of crucial importance within river restoration projects. After germination or vegetative reproduction on river bars juvenile plants are often exposed to mortality by uprooting caused by floods. At later s ...

2011

Effect of dung deposition on small-scale patch structure and seasonal vegetation dynamics in mountain pastures

Alexandre Buttler, Charlotte Vandenberghe, François Gillet

Cattle activity greatly influences plant species composition and biomass production of grassland ecosystems. Dung deposition by cattle together with grazing and trampling can be considered as one of the important factors driving vegetation dynamics in past ...

Elsevier2010