Oscar J. Valverde-Barrantes

TL;DR: A holistic view of the belowground economy is taken and it is shown that root-mycorrhizal collaboration can short circuit a one-dimensional economic spectrum, providing an entire space of economic possibilities.

TL;DR: This Viewpoint addresses the need for a centralized fine-root trait database, and introduces the Fine-Root Ecology Database (FRED), which so far includes > 70 000 observations encompassing a broad range of root traits and also includes associated environmental data.

TL;DR: This study reveals both the large variation in fine-root traits encountered globally and the relevance of several key plant functional types and soil and climate variables for explaining a substantial part of this variation.

TL;DR: It is found that below-ground traits with widest importance in plant and ecosystem functioning are not those most commonly measured, and advocate that establishing causal hierarchical links among root traits will provide a hypothesis-based framework to identify the most parsimonious sets of traits with strongest influence on the functions, and to link genotypes to plant andcosystem functioning.

TL;DR: These analyses provide evidence that the integration of roots and leaves in the PES requires better accounting of the variation in traits across phylogenetic clades, and inclusion of phylogenetic information provides a powerful framework for predictions of belowground functional traits at global scales.