Generalized P Colony Automata and Their Relation to P Automata

We investigate genPCol automata with input mappings that can be realized through the application of finite transducers to the string representations of multisets. We show that using unrestricted programs, these automata characterize the class of recursively enumerable languages. The same holds for systems with all-tape programs, having capacity at least two. In the case of systems with com-tape programs, we show that they characterize language classes which are closely related to those characterized by variants of P automata

Denudation and geomorphic change in the Anthropocene; a global overview

The effects of human activity on geomorphic processes, particularly those related to denudation/sedimentation, are investigated by reviewing case studies and global assessments covering the past few centuries. Evidence we have assembled from different parts of the world, as well as from the literature, show that certain geomorphic processes are experiencing an acceleration, especially since the mid-twentieth century. This suggests that a global geomorphic change is taking place, largely caused by anthropogenic landscape changes

Denudation and geomorphic change in the Anthropocene; a global overview

The effects of human activity on geomorphic processes, particularly those related to denudation/sedimentation, are investigated by reviewing case studies and global assessments covering the past few centuries. Evidence we have assembled from different parts of the world, as well as from the literature, show that certain geomorphic processes are experiencing an acceleration, especially since the mid-twentieth century. This suggests that a global geomorphic change is taking place, largely caused by anthropogenic landscape changes. Direct human-driven denudation (through activities involving excavation, transport, and accumulation of geological materials) has increased by a factor of 30 between 1950 and 2015, representing a ten-fold increase of per capita effect. Direct plus indirectly human-induced denudation (triggered by land surface alteration) is presently at least one order of magnitude greater than denudation due to purely natural processes. The activity of slope movements, which represent an important contribution to denudation, sediment generation and landscape evolution, also shows a clear intensification. Frequency of hazardous events and disasters related to slope movements (an indirect measure of process frequency) in specific regions, as well as at continental and global levels, has grown considerably, in particular after the mid-twentieth century. Intense rainstorm events are often related to slope movement occurrence, but the general increasing trend observed is not satisfactorily explained by climate. Sedimentation has augmented considerably in most regions and all kinds of sedimentation environments. Although the link between denudation and sedimentation is not direct and unequivocal, it is safe to assume that if sedimentation rates increase in different regions during a given period, denudation must have increased too, even though their magnitudes could be different. This augmentation, particularly marked from the second half of the last century onwards, appears to be determined mainly by land surface changes, in conjunction with climate change. The changes observed suggest: a) there is evidence at a global scale of a growing response of geomorphic systems to socio-economic drivers, being Gross Domestic Product density, a good indicator of the human potential to cause such impacts; b) Land use/cover changes enhance effects of climate change on global denudation/sedimentation and landslide/flood frequency, and appear to be a stronger controlling factor; c) Our findings point to the existence of a global geomorphic change. This manifestation of global change is especially evident since the ?great geomorphic acceleration? that began in the middle of the 20th century, and constitutes one of the characteristics of the proposed Anthropocene.This work was supported, at different stages, by projects: FEDER, AEI, CGL2017-82703-R (Ministerio de Ciencia e Investigacion, Spain) and PICT2011-1685; MTM2014-56235-C2-2215 (Ministerio de Ciencia, Tecnología e Innovacion, Argentina). We also thank Dr. Anthony R. Berger for critical review and writing assistance

Species-specific, pan-European diameter increment models based on data of 2.3 million trees

ResearchBackground: Over the last decades, many forest simulators have been developed for the forests of individual European countries. The underlying growth models are usually based on national datasets of varying size, obtained from National Forest Inventories or from long-term research plots. Many of these models include country- and location-specific predictors, such as site quality indices that may aggregate climate, soil properties and topography effects. Consequently, it is not sensible to compare such models among countries, and it is often impossible to apply models outside the region or country they were developed for. However, there is a clear need for more generically applicable but still locally accurate and climate sensitive simulators at the European scale, which requires the development of models that are applicable across the European continent. The purpose of this study is to develop tree diameter increment models that are applicable at the European scale, but still locally accurate. We compiled and used a dataset of diameter increment observations of over 2.3 million trees from 10 National Forest Inventories in Europe and a set of 99 potential explanatory variables covering forest structure, weather, climate, soil and nutrient deposition. Results: Diameter increment models are presented for 20 species/species groups. Selection of explanatory variables was done using a combination of forward and backward selection methods. The explained variance ranged from 10% to 53% depending on the species. Variables related to forest structure (basal area of the stand and relative size of the tree) contributed most to the explained variance, but environmental variables were important to account for spatial patterns. The type of environmental variables included differed greatly among species. Conclusions: The presented diameter increment models are the first of their kind that are applicable at the European scale. This is an important step towards the development of a new generation of forest development simulators that can be applied at the European scale, but that are sensitive to variations in growing conditions and applicable to a wider range of management systems than before. This allows European scale but detailed analyses concerning topics like CO2 sequestration, wood mobilisation, long term impact of management, etcinfo:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Co-limitation towards lower latitudes shapes global forest diversity gradients

The latitudinal diversity gradient (LDG) is one of the most recognized global patterns of species richness exhibited across a wide range of taxa. Numerous hypotheses have been proposed in the past two centuries to explain LDG, but rigorous tests of the drivers of LDGs have been limited by a lack of high-quality global species richness data. Here we produce a high-resolution (0.025° × 0.025°) map of local tree species richness using a global forest inventory database with individual tree information and local biophysical characteristics from ~1.3 million sample plots. We then quantify drivers of local tree species richness patterns across latitudes. Generally, annual mean temperature was a dominant predictor of tree species richness, which is most consistent with the metabolic theory of biodiversity (MTB). However, MTB underestimated LDG in the tropics, where high species richness was also moderated by topographic, soil and anthropogenic factors operating at local scales. Given that local landscape variables operate synergistically with bioclimatic factors in shaping the global LDG pattern, we suggest that MTB be extended to account for co-limitation by subordinate drivers

Contributions of nitrogen deposition and forest regrowth to terrestrial carbon uptake

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>The amount of reactive nitrogen deposited on land has doubled globally and become at least five-times higher in Europe, Eastern United States, and South East Asia since 1860 mostly because of increases in fertilizer production and fossil fuel burning. Because vegetation growth in the Northern Hemisphere is typically nitrogen-limited, increased nitrogen deposition could have an attenuating effect on rising atmospheric CO₂by stimulating the vegetation productivity and accumulation of carbon in biomass.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>This study shows that elevated nitrogen deposition would not significantly enhance land carbon uptake unless we consider its effects on re-growing forests. Our results suggest that nitrogen enriched land ecosystems sequestered 0.62–2.33 PgC in the 1980s and 0.75–2.21 PgC in the 1990s depending on the proportion and age of re-growing forests. During these two decades land ecosystems are estimated to have absorbed 13–41% of carbon emitted by fossil fuel burning.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Although land ecosystems and especially forests with lifted nitrogen limitations have the potential to decelerate the rise of CO₂concentrations in the atmosphere, the effect is only significant over a limited period of time. The carbon uptake associated with forest re-growth and amplified by high nitrogen deposition will decrease as soon as the forests reach maturity. Therefore, assessments relying on carbon stored on land from enhanced atmospheric nitrogen deposition to balance fossil fuel emissions may be inaccurate.</p

Evenness mediates the global relationship between forest productivity and richness

1. Biodiversity is an important component of natural ecosystems, with higher species richness often correlating with an increase in ecosystem productivity. Yet, this relationship varies substantially across environments, typically becoming less pronounced at high levels of species richness. However, species richness alone cannot reflect all important properties of a community, including community evenness, which may mediate the relationship between biodiversity and productivity. If the evenness of a community correlates negatively with richness across forests globally, then a greater number of species may not always increase overall diversity and productivity of the system. Theoretical work and local empirical studies have shown that the effect of evenness on ecosystem functioning may be especially strong at high richness levels, yet the consistency of this remains untested at a global scale. 2. Here, we used a dataset of forests from across the globe, which includes composition, biomass accumulation and net primary productivity, to explore whether productivity correlates with community evenness and richness in a way that evenness appears to buffer the effect of richness. Specifically, we evaluated whether low levels of evenness in speciose communities correlate with the attenuation of the richness–productivity relationship. 3. We found that tree species richness and evenness are negatively correlated across forests globally, with highly speciose forests typically comprising a few dominant and many rare species. Furthermore, we found that the correlation between diversity and productivity changes with evenness: at low richness, uneven communities are more productive, while at high richness, even communities are more productive. 4. Synthesis. Collectively, these results demonstrate that evenness is an integral component of the relationship between biodiversity and productivity, and that the attenuating effect of richness on forest productivity might be partly explained by low evenness in speciose communities. Productivity generally increases with species richness, until reduced evenness limits the overall increases in community diversity. Our research suggests that evenness is a fundamental component of biodiversity–ecosystem function relationships, and is of critical importance for guiding conservation and sustainable ecosystem management decisions

The number of tree species on Earth

One of the most fundamental questions in ecology is how many species inhabit the Earth. However, due to massive logistical and financial challenges and taxonomic difficulties connected to the species concept definition, the global numbers of species, including those of important and well-studied life forms such as trees, still remain largely unknown. Here, based on global ground-sourced data, we estimate the total tree species richness at global, continental, and biome levels. Our results indicate that there are ∼73,000 tree species globally, among which ∼9,000 tree species are yet to be discovered. Roughly 40% of undiscovered tree species are in South America. Moreover, almost one-third of all tree species to be discovered may be rare, with very low populations and limited spatial distribution (likely in remote tropical lowlands and mountains). These findings highlight the vulnerability of global forest biodiversity to anthropogenic changes in land use and climate, which disproportionately threaten rare species and thus, global tree richness

The number of tree species on Earth

One of the most fundamental questions in ecology is how many species inhabit the Earth. However, due to massive logistical and financial challenges and taxonomic difficulties connected to the species concept definition, the global numbers of species, including those of important and well-studied life forms such as trees, still remain largely unknown. Here, based on global ground sourced data, we estimate the total tree species richness at global, continental, and biome levels. Our results indicate that there are ∼73,000 tree species globally, among which ∼9,000 tree species are yet to be discovered. Roughly 40% of undiscovered tree species are in South America. Moreover, almost one-third of all tree species to be discovered may be rare, with very low populations and limited spatial distribution (likely in remote tropical lowlands and mountains). These findings highlight the vulnerability of global forest biodiversity to anthropogenic changes in land use and climate, which disproportionately threaten rare species and thus, global tree richness. Please note an (erratum/corrigendum) for this article is available via https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.220278411

Climatic controls of decomposition drive the global biogeography of forest-tree symbioses

The identity of the dominant root-associated microbial symbionts in a forest determines the ability of trees to access limiting nutrients from atmospheric or soil pools1,2, sequester carbon3,4 and withstand the effects of climate change5,6. Characterizing the global distribution of these symbioses and identifying the factors that control this distribution are thus integral to understanding the present and future functioning of forest ecosystems. Here we generate a spatially explicit global map of the symbiotic status of forests, using a database of over 1.1 million forest inventory plots that collectively contain over 28,000 tree species. Our analyses indicate that climate variables—in particular, climatically controlled variation in the rate of decomposition—are the primary drivers of the global distribution of major symbioses. We estimate that ectomycorrhizal trees, which represent only 2% of all plant species7, constitute approximately 60% of tree stems on Earth. Ectomycorrhizal symbiosis dominates forests in which seasonally cold and dry climates inhibit decomposition, and is the predominant form of symbiosis at high latitudes and elevation. By contrast, arbuscular mycorrhizal trees dominate in aseasonal, warm tropical forests, and occur with ectomycorrhizal trees in temperate biomes in which seasonally warm-and-wet climates enhance decomposition. Continental transitions between forests dominated by ectomycorrhizal or arbuscular mycorrhizal trees occur relatively abruptly along climate-driven decomposition gradients; these transitions are probably caused by positive feedback effects between plants and microorganisms. Symbiotic nitrogen fixers—which are insensitive to climatic controls on decomposition (compared with mycorrhizal fungi)—are most abundant in arid biomes with alkaline soils and high maximum temperatures. The climatically driven global symbiosis gradient that we document provides a spatially explicit quantitative understanding of microbial symbioses at the global scale, and demonstrates the critical role of microbial mutualisms in shaping the distribution of plant species