Vegetation, Ecosystem Processing and Carbon Budget of Wetlands Under Global Change

This research topic focuses on the effects of degradation on alpine wetlands, the carbon process of alpine ecosystems, the restoration of saline land, the adaptation of Tamarix chinensis forests to water-salt heterogeneity, the effects of climate change and human activities on vegetation, the effects of freshwater on plant communities, the allelopathic effects of Phragmites australis, the effects of non-harvest of Miscanthus lutarioriparius, the effects of short-term warming on soil bacterial and fungal communities, the effects of wetland degradation on nitrogen-fixing bacteria, the plant-soil Carbon, Nitrogen, and Phosphorus stoichiometry distributions, the response of seed persistence to increasing groundwater level and salinity, the effects of semiconductor minerals on soil respiration, the response of Zoige alpine meadow to environmental factors, the water uptake tradeoffs of Tamarix chinensis and Ziziphus jujuba, the response of aboveground biomass to climate change, and the competitive abilities of Phragmites australis and Triarrhena lutarioriparius in wetlands.

The findings of this research topic show that degradation significantly changes the relative abundance of bacterial communities, air temperature and soil temperature are the main determinants of monthly CO2 fluxes, planting of different halophytes affects the type of halophyte and the content of seven ions in the surface soil, groundwater level has a significant effect on the fine root morphology, nutrients, and nonstructural carbohydrate characteristics of T. chinensis, human activities are the main driver of vegetation improvement or degradation, introduction of freshwater causes a shift in the interspecific relationships between Suaeda salsa and other species, Phragmites australis extract effectively inhibits the germination of S. salsa, non-harvest of Miscanthus lutarioriparius decreases the capacity of element sinks, warming has no significant effects on the alpha diversity of either the bacterial or the fungal community, soil factors such as TOC, SWC, and TN influence the community composition of nitrogen-fixing bacteria, land-uses have a significant effect on C and N contents, and C:N and N:P ratios in plants, annuals have greater seed persistence than perennials in supratidal wetlands, soil respiration is stimulated by semiconductor mineral photocatalysis, maximum