Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research

About: Swiss Federal Institute for Forest, Snow and Landscape Research is a facility organization based out in Birmensdorf, Switzerland. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Climate change & Soil water. The organization has 1256 authors who have published 3222 publications receiving 161639 citations. The organization is also known as: WSL.

Climate data induced uncertainty in model-based estimations of terrestrial primary productivity

Abstract: Model-based estimations of historical fluxes and pools of the terrestrial biosphere differ substantially. These differences arise not only from differences between models but also from differences in the environmental and climatic data used as input to the models. Here we investigate the role of uncertainties in historical climate data by performing simulations of terrestrial gross primary productivity (GPP) using a process-based dynamic vegetation model (LPJ-GUESS) forced by six different climate datasets. We find that the climate induced uncertainty, defined as the range among historical simulations in GPP when forcing the model with the different climate datasets, can be as high as 11 Pg C yr-1 globally (9 % of mean GPP). We also assessed a hypothetical maximum climate data induced uncertainty by combining climate variables from different datasets, which resulted in significantly larger uncertainties of 41 Pg C yr-1 globally or 32 % of mean GPP. The uncertainty is partitioned into components associated to the three main climatic drivers, temperature, precipitation, and shortwave radiation. Additionally, we illustrate how the uncertainty due to a given climate driver depends both on the magnitude of the forcing data uncertainty (climate data range) and the apparent sensitivity of the modeled GPP to the driver (apparent model sensitivity). We find that LPJ-GUESS overestimates GPP compared to empirically based GPP data product in all land cover classes except for tropical forests. Tropical forests emerge as a disproportionate source of uncertainty in GPP estimation both in the simulations and empirical data products. The tropical forest uncertainty is most strongly associated with shortwave radiation and precipitation forcing, of which climate data range contributes higher to overall uncertainty than apparent model sensitivity to forcing. Globally, precipitation dominates the climate induced uncertainty over nearly half of the vegetated land area, which is mainly due to climate data range and less so due to the apparent model sensitivity. Overall, climate data ranges are found to contribute more to the climate induced uncertainty than apparent model sensitivity to forcing. Our study highlights the need to better constrain tropical climate, and demonstrates that uncertainty caused by climatic forcing data must be considered when comparing and evaluating carbon cycle model results and empirical datasets.

Conceptualizing community resilience to natural hazards - the emBRACE framework

Abstract: . The level of community is considered to be vital for building disaster resilience. Yet, community resilience as a scientific concept often remains vaguely defined and lacks the guiding characteristics necessary for analysing and enhancing resilience on the ground. The emBRACE framework of community resilience presented in this paper provides a heuristic analytical tool for understanding, explaining and measuring community resilience to natural hazards. It was developed in an iterative process building on existing scholarly debates, on empirical case study work in five countries and on participatory consultation with community stakeholders where the framework was applied and ground-tested in different contexts and for different hazard types. The framework conceptualizes resilience across three core domains: (i) resources and capacities, (ii) actions and (iii) learning. These three domains are conceptualized as intrinsically conjoined within a whole. Community resilience is influenced by these integral elements as well as by extra-community forces comprising disaster risk governance and thus laws, policies and responsibilities on the one hand and on the other, the general societal context, natural and human-made disturbances and system change over time. The framework is a graphically rendered heuristic, which through application can assist in guiding the assessment of community resilience in a systematic way and identifying key drivers and barriers of resilience that affect any particular hazard-exposed community.

No stimulation in root production in response to 4 years of in situ CO2 enrichment at the Swiss treeline

Abstract: Summary 1Plants are frequently observed to increase carbon allocation to below-ground sinks and particularly, to accelerate fine root turnover in response to rising atmospheric CO2 concentration. While these strong below-ground responses have predominantly been observed in rapidly expanding systems, late successional plant communities have rarely been studied. 2In an ongoing free air CO2 enrichment (FACE) experiment, we assessed below-ground responses to elevated CO2 after 4 years, in a treeline ecosystem in the Swiss Central Alps (2180 m a.s.l.) dominated by a late successional ericaceous dwarf shrub community (Vaccinium myrtillus, V. uliginosum, Empetrum hermaphroditum), and a sparse overstorey of 30-year-old Larix decidua and Pinus uncinata trees. Measurements included quantification of fine root growth using ingrowth root cores and parallel standing crop harvests and decomposition of roots using litter bags. 3Elevated CO2 did not stimulate root growth of the treated vegetation (although some significant above-ground growth responses were observed), nor did altered root decomposition occur. Root quality measurements indicated that elevated CO2 resulted in significantly higher starch concentrations, but no change in N concentration, or root dehydrogenase activity. 4The use of the stable isotope δ13C permitted us to trace the new carbon entering the system through our CO2 enrichment treatment. We observed that only c. 30% of new root biomass (< 2 mm) was formed by new carbon indicating a rather slow root turnover in this system. 5Our data show that fine root growth may be much less stimulated by elevated CO2 in systems with late successional elements than has been reported in ecosystems with a rapidly expanding plant community biomass.