Brett T. Wolfe

TL;DR: A 'supply-demand' theory for water-limited stomatal behavior that avoids the typical scaffold of empirical response functions is evaluated and promising initial performance suggests the theory could be useful in improving ecosystem models.

TL;DR: Hydraulic limits appear to drive diverse patterns of leaf shedding among tropical trees, supporting the hydraulic fuse hypothesis, but leaf shedding is not universally effective at stabilizing Ψplant, suggesting that the main function of drought deciduousness may vary among species.

TL;DR: Using data from 34 species that span global forest biomes, it is found that the recent carbon-maximisation optimisation theory is widely supported, revealing that the evolution of stomatal regulation has not been primarily driven by attainment of constant marginal water use efficiency.

TL;DR: The capacity to rapidly estimate leaf-mass-per-area (LMA) using only spectral measurements across a wide range of species, leaf age, and canopy position, from diverse biomes is demonstrated, highlighting that the leaf economic spectrum is mirrored by the leaf optical spectrum paving the way for this technology to predict the diversity of LMA in ecosystems across global biomes.

TL;DR: It is revealed that including stomatal sensitivity to declining water potential and consequent impairment of plant water transport will improve predictions during drought conditions and show that many biomes contain a diversity of plant stamatal strategies that range from risky to conservativeStomatal regulation during water stress.