Biodiversity: ecosystem function relationships in southern African woodlands

A broad corpus of previous research has sought to understand the role of biodiversity as a driver of ecosystem structure and function. Although theory suggests that increased biodiversity should increase ecosystem function by niche complementarity among co-existing species, in natural systems wide variation in the biodiversity effect exists among vegetation types and along environmental gradients. In southern African woodlands and savannas, which experience disturbance by fire and herbivory, drought and extreme temperatures, it is unclear whether positive biodiversity effects should occur. In this thesis, I explore the ecology of southern African woodlands through the lens of the biodiversity-ecosystem function relationship, to improve our understanding of the role of tree diversity as a mediator of ecosystem function, its interactions with abiotic environment, and its effect on woodland structure. In temperate and wet tropical forests, where the majority of biodiversity-ecosystem function studies in natural woody vegetation have been conducted, the positive effect of niche complementarity hinges on the condition that conspecific competition is the limiting factor to ecosystem function. In highly disturbed and environmentally stressed systems however, this may not hold true. I conducted a regional study investigating the role of tree species diversity and structural diversity as mediators of woody biomass, using a plot network of 1235 plots spanning wide climatic and biogeographic gradients across southern Africa. Using Structural Equation Modelling, I determined that tree species diversity has a positive effect on biomass, operating mostly via its effect on structural diversity. I found that biodiversity itself increases with water availability, and that positive biodiversity effects only arise under sufficiently high stem density. To further understand the ecological mechanisms which drive positive biodiversity-productivity relationships, I explored the effects of tree species diversity and woodland demographic structure on patterns of land-surface phenology. I combined a dense plot-based tree census dataset across multiple deciduous Zambian woodland types with remotely sensed measures of greenness, to understand drivers of variation in pre-rain green-up, growing season length and productivity. I found that pre-rain green-up occurred earlier in more diverse sites, across all woodland types, while in non-miombo woodlands, species richness also increased post-rain senescence lag and season length. I also found that large-sized trees increase the degree of both pre-rain green-up and post-rain senescence lag, across vegetation types, with an effect size similar to that of species richness. Southern African woodlands occur as a complex mosaic of open grassy patches and closed canopy forest-like patches, driven by positive feedbacks of fire-induced tree mortality and grass growth, but the biotic mechanisms causing variation in canopy closure are unclear. I used terrestrial LiDAR at two sites, in Tanzania and Angola, to understand at fine spatial scale the effects of species composition and diversity on canopy architecture and canopy cover. Species diversity was found to allow increased spatial clumping of trees, which drove vertical canopy layer diversity and canopy height, demonstrating an indirect role of species diversity on canopy cover via stand structure. Taken together with the regional study of the biodiversity-ecosystem function relationship, these findings suggest a nuanced role of tree species diversity on ecosystem function, operating primarily via its effect on canopy structural diversity in southern African woodlands. I propose that higher diversity communities are more likely to produce forest-like closed canopy woodlands, with a higher upper limit on biomass, and are more likely to transition from savanna to closed canopy forest under conditions of atmospheric CO2 enrichment. Finally, in an effort to increase our understanding of the variation in diversity and structure of woodlands across southern Africa, I conducted a study of tree species biodiversity and woodland structure in Bicuar National Park, southwest Angola, with comparison to other woodlands around the miombo ecoregion. Much of the published plot data and woodland monitoring infrastructure in miombo woodlands is located in central and eastern regions of southern Africa, while woodlands in the west of the region, which occur entirely within Angola, remain poorly represented. I found that Bicuar National Park constitutes an important woodland refuge at the transition between dry miombo woodland and Baikiaea-Baphia woodlands. I recorded 27 tree species not recorded elsewhere in the miombo ecoregion outside the Huíla plateau. An additional study of one-off plots in areas previously disturbed by shifting cultivation, found that this disturbance increases tree species diversity, but ultimately reduces woody biomass, even after a period of regeneration, potentially representing a directional shift to a different stable vegetation type. Together, the findings of this thesis demonstrate multiple relationships among tree biodiversity, ecosystem structure, and ecosystem function, measured primarily through woody biomass and productivity, at multiple spatial scales. I conclude that incorporation of diversity and canopy structural information into earth system models, by scaling up plot data using cutting edge remotely sensed datasets, could improve predictions of how climate change and biodiversity change will impact the functioning of different vegetation types across southern Africa, with consequences for carbon cycle modelling, conservation management, and ecosystem service provision. Finally, I suggest that biodiversity loss of large archetypal miombo tree species will have the greatest impact on a number of ecosystem functions related to carbon cycling, raising concerns over the impacts of selective logging of these species

Public Availability of Published Research Data in High-Impact Journals

BACKGROUND: There is increasing interest to make primary data from published research publicly available. We aimed to assess the current status of making research data available in highly-cited journals across the scientific literature. METHODS AND RESULTS: We reviewed the first 10 original research papers of 2009 published in the 50 original research journals with the highest impact factor. For each journal we documented the policies related to public availability and sharing of data. Of the 50 journals, 44 (88%) had a statement in their instructions to authors related to public availability and sharing of data. However, there was wide variation in journal requirements, ranging from requiring the sharing of all primary data related to the research to just including a statement in the published manuscript that data can be available on request. Of the 500 assessed papers, 149 (30%) were not subject to any data availability policy. Of the remaining 351 papers that were covered by some data availability policy, 208 papers (59%) did not fully adhere to the data availability instructions of the journals they were published in, most commonly (73%) by not publicly depositing microarray data. The other 143 papers that adhered to the data availability instructions did so by publicly depositing only the specific data type as required, making a statement of willingness to share, or actually sharing all the primary data. Overall, only 47 papers (9%) deposited full primary raw data online. None of the 149 papers not subject to data availability policies made their full primary data publicly available. CONCLUSION: A substantial proportion of original research papers published in high-impact journals are either not subject to any data availability policies, or do not adhere to the data availability instructions in their respective journals. This empiric evaluation highlights opportunities for improvement

Climate Change and Local Public Health in the United States: Preparedness, Programs and Perceptions of Local Public Health Department Directors

While climate change is inherently a global problem, its public health impacts will be experienced most acutely at the local and regional level, with some jurisdictions likely to be more burdened than others. The public health infrastructure in the U.S. is organized largely as an interlocking set of public agencies at the federal, state and local level, with lead responsibility for each city or county often residing at the local level. To understand how directors of local public health departments view and are responding to climate change as a public health issue, we conducted a telephone survey with 133 randomly selected local health department directors, representing a 61% response rate. A majority of respondents perceived climate change to be a problem in their jurisdiction, a problem they viewed as likely to become more common or severe over the next 20 years. Only a small minority of respondents, however, had yet made climate change adaptation or prevention a top priority for their health department. This discrepancy between problem recognition and programmatic responses may be due, in part, to several factors: most respondents felt personnel in their health department–and other key stakeholders in their community–had a lack of knowledge about climate change; relatively few respondents felt their own health department, their state health department, or the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention had the necessary expertise to help them create an effective mitigation or adaptation plan for their jurisdiction; and most respondents felt that their health department needed additional funding, staff and staff training to respond effectively to climate change. These data make clear that climate change adaptation and prevention are not currently major activities at most health departments, and that most, if not all, local health departments will require assistance in making this transition. We conclude by making the case that, through their words and actions, local health departments and their staff can and should play a role in alerting members of their community about the prospect of public health impacts from climate change in their jurisdiction

Structural diversity and tree density drives variation in the biodiversity-ecosystem function relationship of woodlands and savannas

Positive biodiversity-ecosystem function relationships (BEFRs) have been widely documented, but it is unclear if BEFRs should be expected in disturbance-driven systems. Disturbance may limit competition and niche differentiation, which are frequently posited to underlie BEFRs. We provide the first exploration of the relationship between tree species diversity and biomass, one measure of ecosystem function, across southern African woodlands and savannas, an ecological system rife with disturbance from fire, herbivores and humans. We used >1000 vegetation plots distributed across 10 southern African countries, and structural equation modelling, to determine the relationship between tree species diversity and aboveground woody biomass, accounting for interacting effects of resource availability, disturbance by fire, tree stem density and vegetation type. We found positive effects of tree species diversity on aboveground biomass, operating via increased structural diversity. The observed BEFR was highly dependent on organismal density, with a minimum threshold of c. 180 mature stems ha-1. We found that water availability mainly affects biomass indirectly, via increasing species diversity. The study underlines the close association between tree diversity, ecosystem structure, environment and function in highly disturbed savannas and woodlands. We suggest that tree diversity is an under-appreciated determinant of wooded ecosystem structure and function

Drought stress and tree size determine stem CO2 efflux in a tropical forest

CO2 efflux from stems (CO2_stem) accounts for a substantial fraction of tropical forest gross primary productivity, but the climate sensitivity of this flux remains poorly understood. We present a study of tropical forest CO2_stem from 215 trees across wet and dry seasons, at the world's longest running tropical forest drought experiment site. We show a 27% increase in wet season CO2_stem in the droughted forest relative to a control forest. This was driven by increasing CO2_stem in trees 10–40 cm diameter. Furthermore, we show that drought increases the proportion of maintenance to growth respiration in trees > 20 cm diameter, including large increases in maintenance respiration in the largest droughted trees, > 40 cm diameter. However, we found no clear taxonomic influence on CO2_stem and were unable to accurately predict how drought sensitivity altered ecosystem scale CO2_stem, due to substantial uncertainty introduced by contrasting methods previously employed to scale CO2_stem fluxes. Our findings indicate that under future scenarios of elevated drought, increases in CO2_stem may augment carbon losses, weakening or potentially reversing the tropical forest carbon sink. However, due to substantial uncertainties in scaling CO2_stem fluxes, stand‐scale future estimates of changes in stem CO2 emissions remain highly uncertain.This work is a product of a UK NERC independent fellowship grant NE/N014022/1 to L.R., a UK NERC grant NE/J011002/1 to P.M. and M.M., CNPQ grant 457914/2013-0/MCTI/CNPq/FNDCT/LBA/ESECAFLOR to A.C.L.d.C., an ARC grant FT110100457 to P.M. It was previously supported by NERC NER/A/S/2002/00487, NERC GR3/11706, EU FP5-Carbonsink and EU FP7-Amazalert to P.M

Leaders, leadership and future primary care clinical research

Background: A strong and self confident primary care workforce can deliver the highest quality care and outcomes equitably and cost effectively. To meet the increasing demands being made of it, primary care needs its own thriving research culture and knowledge base. Methods: Review of recent developments supporting primary care clinical research. Results: Primary care research has benefited from a small group of passionate leaders and significant investment in recent decades in some countries. Emerging from this has been innovation in research design and focus, although less is known of the effect on research output. Conclusion: Primary care research is now well placed to lead a broad re-vitalisation of academic medicine, answering questions of relevance to practitioners, patients, communities and Government. Key areas for future primary care research leaders to focus on include exposing undergraduates early to primary care research, integrating this early exposure with doctoral and postdoctoral research career support, further expanding cross disciplinary approaches, and developing useful measures of output for future primary care research investment

Drought stress and tree size determine stem CO2 efflux in tropical forests

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Wiley for New Phytologist Trust via the DOI in this record.1. CO2 efflux from stems (CO2_stem) accounts for a substantial fraction of tropical forest gross primary productivity, but the climate sensitivity of this flux remains poorly understood. 2. We present a study of tropical forest CO2_stem from 215 trees across wet and dry seasons, at the world’s longest running tropical forest drought experiment site. 3. We show a 27% increase in wet season CO2_stem in the droughted forest relative to a control forest. This was driven by increasing CO2_stem in trees 10-40 cm diameter. Furthermore, we show that drought increases the proportion of maintenance to growth respiration in trees >20 cm diameter, including large increases in maintenance respiration in the largest droughted trees, >40 cm diameter. However, we found no clear taxonomic influence on CO2_stem and were unable to accurately predict how drought sensitivity altered ecosystem scale CO2_stem, due to substantial uncertainty introduced by contrasting methods previously employed to scale CO2_stem fluxes. 4. Our findings indicate that under future scenarios of elevated drought, increases in CO2_stem may augment carbon losses, weakening or potentially reversing the tropical forest carbon sink. However, due to substantial uncertainties in scaling CO2_stem fluxes, stand-scale future estimates of changes in stem CO2 emissions remain highly uncertain.This work is a product of a UK NERC independent fellowship grant NE/N014022/1 to LR, a UK NERC grant NE/J011002/1 to PM and MM, CNPQ grant 457914/2013-0/MCTI/CNPq/FNDCT/LBA/ESECAFLOR to ACLD, an ARC grant FT110100457 to PM. It was previously supported by NERC NER/A/S/2002/00487, NERC GR3/11706, EU FP5-Carbonsink and EU FP7-Amazalert to PM. LR would also like to acknowledge the support of Dr. Robert Clement, University of Edinburgh and Dr. Timothy Hill, University of Exeter, alongside the contribution of three anonymous reviewers