Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology

About: Nanjing University of Information Science and Technology is a education organization based out in Nanjing, China. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Precipitation & Aerosol. The organization has 14129 authors who have published 17985 publications receiving 267578 citations. The organization is also known as: Nan Xin Da.

Spatially nonrandom tree mortality and ingrowth maintain equilibrium pattern in an old-growth Pseudotsuga–Tsuga forest

Abstract: Mortality processes in old-growth forests are generally assumed to be driven by gap-scale disturbance, with only a limited role ascribed to density-dependent mortality, but these assumptions are rarely tested with data sets incorporating repeated measurements. Using a 12-ha spatially explicit plot censused 13 years apart in an approximately 500-year-old Pseudotsuga–Tsuga forest, we demonstrate significant density-dependent mortality and spatially aggregated tree recruitment. However, the combined effect of these strongly nonrandom demographic processes was to maintain tree patterns in a state of dynamic equilibrium. Density-dependent mortality was most pronounced for the dominant late-successional species, Tsuga heterophylla. The long-lived, early-seral Pseudotsuga menziesii experienced an annual stem mortality rate of 0.84% and no new recruitment. Late-seral species Tsuga and Abies amabilis had nearly balanced demographic rates of ingrowth and mortality. The 2.34% mortality rate for Taxus brevifolia was ...

Recent divergence in the contributions of tropical and boreal forests to the terrestrial carbon sink

Abstract: Anthropogenic land use and land cover changes (LULCC) have a large impact on the global terrestrial carbon sink, but this effect is not well characterized according to biogeographical region. Here, using state-of-the-art Earth observation data and a dynamic global vegetation model, we estimate the impact of LULCC on the contribution of biomes to the terrestrial carbon sink between 1992 and 2015. Tropical and boreal forests contributed equally, and with the largest share of the mean global terrestrial carbon sink. CO2 fertilization was found to be the main driver increasing the terrestrial carbon sink from 1992 to 2015, but the net effect of all drivers (CO2 fertilization and nitrogen deposition, LULCC and meteorological forcing) caused a reduction and an increase, respectively, in the terrestrial carbon sink for tropical and boreal forests. These diverging trends were not observed when applying a conventional LULCC dataset, but were also evident in satellite passive microwave estimates of aboveground biomass. These datasets thereby converge on the conclusion that LULCC have had a greater impact on tropical forests than previously estimated, causing an increase and decrease of the contributions of boreal and tropical forests, respectively, to the growing terrestrial carbon sink.

Decadal northward shift of the Meiyu belt and the possible cause

Abstract: The feature of the decadal movement of the Meiyu belt and their association with East Asia atmospheric circulation for the period of 1979–2007 is examined in this study. It is shown that the Meiyu belt of China has a decadal shift in the late 1990s. There is a remarkable difference between the periods before and after 1999, with the Meiyu belt mainly located to the south of the Yangtze River valley before 1999, but afterward mainly located in the Huaihe River valley. At the same time, a distinctive tropospheric warming and stratospheric cooling trend is found in the mid-latitudes of East Asia, which causes the upper tropospheric pressure surfaces upward bulging and the tropoause elevated in the subtropics and associated widening of the subtropical area over East Asia. Accompanying the subtropics widening, the subtropical westerly jet over East Asia shifts northward and the East Asia tropical Hadley circulation expands poleward, which results in the northward shift of the Meiyu belt.