CLIMMANI/INTERFACE joint workshop:
SCALING CLIMATE CHANGE EXPERIMENTS ACROSS SPACE AND TIME: Challenges of informing large-scale models with small-scale experiments
June 4-7th 2013
Mikulov, Czech Republic
Climate change experiments in terrestrial ecosystems build our fundamental understanding of plant and ecosystem responses to climatic perturbations, and this information informs model design and parameterization. Experiments typically focus on drivers and responses at relatively small scales (spatial and temporal). Scaling the information from these plot-level experiments to landscape- or global-scale models operating over decades or centuries provides a significant challenge. In recent years, climate change research has increasingly acknowledged the importance of extreme events as a significant component of climate change. This provides an additional and significant challenge in both experimentation and modelling. This workshop, co-hosted by ClimMani and INTERFACE, brought together experimentalists and modellers to discuss challenges associated with scaling, present the current state of the art, and identify future directions for overcoming the disparities in scales between climate change experiments and plot and global scale models.
The workshop focused on four themes:
- Scaling from small plots to landscapes and regions: what works, and what doesn't?
- What have we learned from work on elevational and environmental gradients?
- Drivers of biome shifts: Making small-scale measurements of disturbance, tipping points, thresholds, and mortality relevant for large-scale models
- Trait responses to environmental change - Maximizing the benefits of trait information and moving from static to dynamic traits
This scientific workshop took place in Mikulov, in the Czech Republic, from June 4-7. We believe the four session topics will provide critical insights into how experiments can be designed to understand impacts of key climate change-related drivers, and how these drivers can be linked to modeling at the plot, regional and global scales. A special focus of the conference is how to represent extreme events better in both experiments and modeling. Each session provided 4-5 presentations to synthesize and discuss the state of knowledge within the area and indentify gaps in knowledge and abilities to model it at a local and global scale. Each session was chaired by researchers from the US and Europe with particular experience within the topic. In addition to talks, there was a poster session, breakout sessions, and time for discussion. The overall organizing committee consisted of Petr Holub and Karel Klem from the Czech Republic, and the chairs of ClimMani (Claus Beier, DTU, DK) and INTERFACE (Jeff Dukes, Purdue University, US). The scientific sessions were organized by the session chairs.
Sessions and session chairs
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Scientific organizing committee |
Local organizers - Czechglobe: Petr Holub Karel Klem
Session chairs: See below
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Network Chairs: ClimMani: Claus Beier INTERFACE Jeff Dukes |
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Session topic |
Presentations (with slides) |
Session chairs |
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Scaling from small plots to landscapes and regions: what works, and what doesn't? |
How well do small plots in short-term experiments inform us about long-term landscape- and regional-scale responses? Lessons learned from past attempts at scaling. Scaling approaches - how well have they worked (advantages/disadvantages).
Speakers
Philip Fay (US) - "long-term precipitation/climate manipulation experiments"download Carl Beierkuhnlein (DE) – “Spatial, temporal and biological scales in ecological climate change research - heuristic experiments vs. pragmatic models”download Caroline Farrior (US) – “Analytically tractable, individual-based model and quantitative comparisons to data”download Simon Scheiter (DE) - “Impacts of climate change on the vegetation of Africa: an adaptive dynamic vegetation modelling approach”download |
Hans de Boeck
Elena Shevliakova
Sophie Zechmeister Boltenstern
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What have we learned from work on elevational / environmental gradients |
Studies along successional, elevational, latitudinal/longitudinal and climatic gradients. Can we now say whether "space for time" substitutions work? How well do models capture changes in ecosystem processes along environmental gradients? Does this give us confidence in their representations of ecosystem responses to environmental changes?
Speakers
Melannie Hartman (US) – “Use of gradient environmental data to test Earth system models”download Christian Körner (Basel University, CH) "Experiments by nature: Lessons from the environmental gradients for global Change research"download Bill Parton (US) " Environmental Change in the US Great Plains Grasslands: Linking experimental results, Ecosystem Models and Regional Model Predictions"download Michael Zimmerman (AT) - "Soil warming experiments: bringing the climate to the soil or the soil to the climate?"download |
Aimee Classen
Christian Körner
Bill Parton
Sophie Zechmeister Boltenstern
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Drivers of biome shifts: Making small-scale measurements of disturbance, tipping points, thresholds, and mortality relevant for large-scale models |
Increased frequency and more severe extreme climatic events will potentially lead to more exceedance of important thresholds and tipping points. It is a significant challenge to conduct relevant experiments addressing these, and even more to scale up such experimental and field data on responses to extreme events. Relevant topics in the session are: Thresholds and tipping points in experiments and in models, extreme events experiments, generalizing threshold exceedance experiments in models, disturbance ecology, mortality, hydraulic failure, carbon starvation.
Speakers
Melinda Smith (US) - Conceptual understanding ecological consequences of climate extremes and extreme climatic events download Jose Gruenzweig (Israel) - "Impacts of drought on mediteranean ecosystems studied along a altitudinal gradient" download Chelsea Arnold (US) - "Soil structure changes in response to extreme frost and consequences for soil respiration in meadows of Yosemite National Park, California" download Bill Parton (US) – “Ecosystem Response of Great Plains Grasslands to Climate Variability” download |
Claus Beier
Petr Holub
Lindsey Rustad
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Trait responses to environmental change - Maximizing the benefits of trait information and moving from static to dynamic traits |
How can we best take advantage of knowledge about trait responses to experimental manipulations and environmental gradients (Phenotypic plasticity? Tissue traits, Whole plant traits)? Should we be accumulating more trait data. What type of data are needed most? Do we need to depart from static traits and into dynamic traits, to help explain species-specific responses to atmospheric change.
Speakers
Peter van Bodegom (NL) - "Impacts of including trait variation on predictions of global carbon fluxes and vegetation distribution" download Jordi Sardans (CREAF, ES) - "Dynamics of stoichiometrical and metabolomical traits under climate change" download Jeanne Osnas (US) "Leaf area- vs. mass-proportionality of leaf traits within canopies and across species: patterns and analytical consequences" download William Hoffmann (US) - "Tropical Biome Shifts: What models get wrong and why" download |
Jeff Dukes
Josep Penuelas
Peter van Bodegom
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3rd June |
4th June |
5th June |
6th June |
7th June |
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9.00-12.30. |
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Arrival |
Science session |
Science session |
Science session, discussion and wrap up |
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12.30 – 13.30 |
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Lunch |
Lunch |
Lunch and/or departure |
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13.30-15.30 |
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Excursion |
Science session & Lunch |
Science session & Lunch |
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16.00-18.30 |
Arrival for some |
Excursion
Arrival for some |
Break out & poster sessions |
Break out sessions |
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Conference dinner |
dinner |
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Global Maps
Network Map
