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Thermal optimality of net ecosystem exchange of carbon dioxide and underlying mechanisms

  1. Shuli Niu1,
  2. Yiqi Luo1,2,
  3. Shenfeng Fei1,
  4. Wenping Yuan3,
  5. David Schimel4,
  6. Beverly E. Law5,
  7. Christof Ammann6,
  8. M. Altaf Arain7,
  9. Almut Arneth8,9,
  10. Marc Aubinet10,
  11. Alan Barr11,
  12. Jason Beringer12,
  13. Christian Bernhofer13,
  14. T. Andrew Black14,
  15. Nina Buchmann15,
  16. Alessandro Cescatti16,
  17. Jiquan Chen17,
  18. Kenneth J. Davis18,
  19. Ebba Dellwik19,
  20. Ankur R. Desai20,
  21. Sophia Etzold15,
  22. Louis Francois21,
  23. Damiano Gianelle22,
  24. Bert Gielen23,
  25. Allen Goldstein24,
  26. Margriet Groenendijk25,
  27. Lianhong Gu26,
  28. Niall Hanan27,
  29. Carole Helfter28,
  30. Takashi Hirano29,
  31. David Y. Hollinger30,
  32. Mike B. Jones31,
  33. Gerard Kiely32,
  34. Thomas E. Kolb33,
  35. Werner L. Kutsch34,
  36. Peter Lafleur35,
  37. David M. Lawrence36,
  38. Linghao Li37,
  39. Anders Lindroth8,
  40. Marcy Litvak38,
  41. Denis Loustau39,
  42. Magnus Lund8,
  43. Michal Marek40,
  44. Timothy A. Martin41,
  45. Giorgio Matteucci42,
  46. Mirco Migliavacca16,
  47. Leonardo Montagnani43,44,
  48. Eddy Moors45,
  49. J. William Munger46,
  50. Asko Noormets47,
  51. Walter Oechel48,
  52. Janusz Olejnik49,
  53. Kyaw Tha Paw U50,
  54. Kim Pilegaard51,
  55. Serge Rambal52,
  56. Antonio Raschi53,
  57. Russell L. Scott54,
  58. Günther Seufert16,
  59. Donatella Spano55,
  60. Paul Stoy56,
  61. Mark A. Sutton30,
  62. Andrej Varlagin57,
  63. Timo Vesala58,
  64. Ensheng Weng1,
  65. Georg Wohlfahrt59,
  66. Bai Yang26,
  67. Zhongda Zhang1,
  68. Xuhui Zhou2

Article first published online: 7 MAR 2012

DOI: 10.1111/j.1469-8137.2012.04095.x

Issue

New Phytologist

New Phytologist

Volume 194, Issue 3, pages 775–783, May 2012

Additional Information

How to Cite

Niu, S., Luo, Y., Fei, S., Yuan, W., Schimel, D., Law, B. E., Ammann, C., Altaf Arain, M., Arneth, A., Aubinet, M., Barr, A., Beringer, J., Bernhofer, C., Andrew Black, T., Buchmann, N., Cescatti, A., Chen, J., Davis, K. J., Dellwik, E., Desai, A. R., Etzold, S., Francois, L., Gianelle, D., Gielen, B., Goldstein, A., Groenendijk, M., Gu, L., Hanan, N., Helfter, C., Hirano, T., Hollinger, D. Y., Jones, M. B., Kiely, G., Kolb, T. E., Kutsch, W. L., Lafleur, P., Lawrence, D. M., Li, L., Lindroth, A., Litvak, M., Loustau, D., Lund, M., Marek, M., Martin, T. A., Matteucci, G., Migliavacca, M., Montagnani, L., Moors, E., William Munger, J., Noormets, A., Oechel, W., Olejnik, J., U, K. T. P., Pilegaard, K., Rambal, S., Raschi, A., Scott, R. L., Seufert, G., Spano, D., Stoy, P., Sutton, M. A., Varlagin, A., Vesala, T., Weng, E., Wohlfahrt, G., Yang, B., Zhang, Z. and Zhou, X. (2012), Thermal optimality of net ecosystem exchange of carbon dioxide and underlying mechanisms. New Phytologist, 194: 775–783. doi: 10.1111/j.1469-8137.2012.04095.x

Author Information

  1. 1

    Department of Botany and Microbiology, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019, USA

  2. 2

    Institute of Global Environmental Change Research, Fudan University, Shanghai, China

  3. 3

    College of Global Change and Earth System Science, Beijing Normal University, Beijing 100875, China

  4. 4

    NEON, Inc., 5340 Airport Blvd, Boulder, CO 80301, USA

  5. 5

    College of Forestry, Oregon State University, Corvallis, OR 97331-2209, USA

  6. 6

    Federal Research Station Agroscope Reckenholz-Tänikon, Reckenholzstr. 191, 8046 Zürich, Switzerland

  7. 7

    School of Geography and Earth Sciences, McMaster University, Hamilton, ON, Canada L8S 4K1

  8. 8

    Department of Physical Geography and Ecosystems Analysis, Lund University, 223 62 Lund, Sweden

  9. 9

    Atmospheric Environmental Research, Institute of Meteorology and Climate Research, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany

  10. 10

    Faculté Universitaire des Sciences Agronomiques de Gembloux, Unitéde Physique des Biosystémes, B-5030 Gembloux, Belgium

  11. 11

    Climate Research Division, Environment Canada, Saskatoon, SK S7N 3H5, Canada

  12. 12

    School of Geography and Environmental Science, Monash University, Clayton, Vic 3800, Australia

  13. 13

    Institute of Hydrology and Meteorology, Chair of Meteorology, Technische Universität Dresden, 01062 Dresden, Germany

  14. 14

    Land and Food Systems, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC, Canada V6T 1Z4

  15. 15

    ETH, Zurich, Institute of Plant Science, Universitaetsstrasse 2, Zürich 8092, Switzerland

  16. 16

    European Commission, Joint Research Center, Institute for Environment and Sustainability, Ispra, Italy

  17. 17

    Department of Environmental Sciences (DES), University of Toledo, Toledo, OH 43606, USA

  18. 18

    Earth System Science Center, Pennsylvania State University, State College, PA 16802, USA

  19. 19

    Wind Energy Division, Risø National Laboratory for Sustainable Energy, Technical University of Denmark, P.O. 49, DK-4000 Roskilde, Denmark

  20. 20

    Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WC, 53706, USA

  21. 21

    Unité de Modélisation du Climat et des Cycles Biogéochimiques (UMCCB) Université de Liège, B-4000 Liège, Belgium

  22. 22

    Sustainable Agro-ecosystems and Bioresources Department, IASMA Research and Innovation Centre, Fondazione Edmund Mach, Via E. Mach 1, 38010 San Michele all’Adige, (TN), Italy

  23. 23

    Department of Biology, University of Antwerpen, Universiteitsplein 1, Wilrijk, B-2610, Belgium

  24. 24

    Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA

  25. 25

    Department of Earth Science, Faculty of Earth and Life Sciences, VU University Amsterdam, Boelelaan 1085, 1081 HV Amsterdam, the Netherlands

  26. 26

    Environmental Sciences Division, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, Tennessee 37831 USA

  27. 27

    Geographic Information Science Center of Excellence (GIScCE), South Dakota State University, 1021 Medary Ave., Wecota Hall 506B, Brookings, SD 57007-3510, USA

  28. 28

    Centre for Ecology and Hydrology (CEH), Bush Estate, Penicuik, Midlothian, Scotland EH26 0QB, UK

  29. 29

    Hokkaido University N9, W9, Kita-ku, Sapporo, Hokkaido, 060-8589, Japan

  30. 30

    USDA Forest Service, Northern Research Station, Durham, NH 03824, USA

  31. 31

    Botany Department, Trinity College of Dublin, Dublin, Ireland

  32. 32

    Civil and Environmental Engineering Department, University College Cork, Cork, Ireland

  33. 33

    School of Forestry, Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff, AZ 86001, USA

  34. 34

    Johann Heinrich von Thünen-Institute (vTI), Institute for Climate Research, Braunschweig, Germany

  35. 35

    Department of Geography, Trent University, Peterborough, ON K9J 7B8, Canada

  36. 36

    National Center for Atmospheric Research, Boulder, CO 80305, USA

  37. 37

    State Key laboratory of Vegetation and Environmental Changes, Institute of Botany, Chinese Academy of Sciences

  38. 38

    Biology Department, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM 87131-001, USA

  39. 39

    INRA, UR1263 EPHYSE, F-33140, Villenave d’Ornon, France

  40. 40

    Institute of Systems Biology and Ecology, Academy of Sciences of the Czech Republic, Poříčí3b, CZ-60300 Brno, Czech Republic

  41. 41

    University of Florida, Gainesville, FL 32611, USA

  42. 42

    National Research Council, Institute of Agroenvironmental and Forest Biology, 00015 Monterotondo Scalo (RM), Italy

  43. 43

    Servizi Forestali, Agenzia per l’Ambiente, Provincia Autonoma di Bolzano, 39100, Bolzano, Italy

  44. 44

    Faculty of Science and Technology, Free University of Bolzano, Piazza Università 1, 39100 Bolzano, Italy

  45. 45

    ESS-CC, Alterra, Wageningen UR, PO Box 47, 6700 AA Wageningen, The Netherlands NL

  46. 46

    Department of Earth and Planetary Sciences, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, 02138, USA

  47. 47

    North Carolina State University/USDA Forest Service, Southern Global Change Program, Raleigh, NC, 27606, USA

  48. 48

    Department of Biology, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA 92182-4614, USA

  49. 49

    Meteorology Department, Poznan University of Life Sciences (PULS), 60-667 Poznan, Poland

  50. 50

    Atmospheric Science Group, LAWR, UC Davis, Davis, CA 95616, USA

  51. 51

    Biosystems Division, Risø National Laboratory for Sustainable Energy, Technical University of Denmark, P.O. 49, DK-4000 Roskilde, Denmark

  52. 52

    DREAM, CEFE, CNRS, UMR5175, 1919 route de Mende, F-34293 Montpellier, Cedex 5, France

  53. 53

    CNR – Instituto di Biometeorologia (IBIMET), Via Giovanni Caproni 8, 50145 Firenze, Italy

  54. 54

    USDA-ARS Southwest Watershed Research Center, Tucson, AZ 85719, USA

  55. 55

    Department of Economics and Woody Plant Ecosystems, University of Sassari, Sassari, Italy

  56. 56

    Department of Land Resources and Environmental Sciences, Montana State University, Bozeman, MT 59717, USA

  57. 57

    A.N. Severtsov Institute of Ecology and Evolution, Russian Academy of Sciences, Lenisky pr., 33 Moscow, 119071, Russia

  58. 58

    Department of Physics, FI-00014, University of Helsinki, Finland

  59. 59

    University of Innsbruck, Institute of Ecology Sternwartestr 15, Innsbruck 6020, Austria

*Author for correspondence: Shuli Niu Tel: +1 405 325 8578 Email: sniu@ou.edu

Publication History

  1. Issue published online: 10 APR 2012
  2. Article first published online: 7 MAR 2012
  3. Received: 15 December 2011, Accepted: 26 January 2012

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Keywords:

  • climate change;
  • optimum temperature;
  • temperature acclimation;
  • temperature adaptation;
  • thermal optimality

Summary

  • •
    It is well established that individual organisms can acclimate and adapt to temperature to optimize their functioning. However, thermal optimization of ecosystems, as an assemblage of organisms, has not been examined at broad spatial and temporal scales.
  • •
    Here, we compiled data from 169 globally distributed sites of eddy covariance and quantified the temperature response functions of net ecosystem exchange (NEE), an ecosystem-level property, to determine whether NEE shows thermal optimality and to explore the underlying mechanisms.
  • •
    We found that the temperature response of NEE followed a peak curve, with the optimum temperature (corresponding to the maximum magnitude of NEE) being positively correlated with annual mean temperature over years and across sites. Shifts of the optimum temperature of NEE were mostly a result of temperature acclimation of gross primary productivity (upward shift of optimum temperature) rather than changes in the temperature sensitivity of ecosystem respiration.
  • •
    Ecosystem-level thermal optimality is a newly revealed ecosystem property, presumably reflecting associated evolutionary adaptation of organisms within ecosystems, and has the potential to significantly regulate ecosystem–climate change feedbacks. The thermal optimality of NEE has implications for understanding fundamental properties of ecosystems in changing environments and benchmarking global models.
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