Altitudinal variation in drought resilience of Tianshan spruce (Picea schrenkiana) in the Middle Tianshan Mountains, China
August 2026
Understanding how forest resilience varies with altitude is critical for predicting drought responses in mountain ecosystems. As a major water source for arid Central Asia, the Tianshan Mountains have...
Continental-scale mapping of forest tree density in North America using remote sensing and deep learning with uncertainty quantification
August 2026
Accurate, spatially consistent estimates of tree density remain elusive at continental scales, limiting our ability to assess forest structure, carbon stocks, and biodiversity. Existing global assessments...
A global meta-analysis reveals coupled biogeochemical and microbial successional trajectories in forest soils
August 2026
Forest succession fundamentally reshapes soil biogeochemistry and the resident microbial communities, yet a synthesis of global response patterns has been hindered by methodological inconsistencies...
Meta-analysis of 21st century studies shows that deforestation induces profound changes in soil characteristics, particularly soil organic carbon accumulation
April 2025
Deforestation is one of the most serious environmental problems facing humankind. It continues to escalate rapidly across many regions of the world, thereby deteriorating the forest soil quality. This...
Microbial necromass underpins long-term soil carbon stability and ecosystem carbon persistence in pine reforestations
August 2026
The long-term carbon (C) sequestration potential of plantations hinges on the dynamics and persistence of mature forest C sinks, yet how C storage and stability evolve with increasing forest age remains...
Dominant species stability outweighs species asynchrony and diversity in regulating temperate forest regeneration
August 2026
Climate change increasingly threatens forest regeneration by disrupting seedling dynamics, yet the stabilizing mechanisms underpinning these critical early life stages remain poorly understood. Using...
Severe droughts alter the resistance–recovery tradeoff in the drylands of northern China
August 2026
Increasing drought intensity under global climate change poses significant threats to the stability of terrestrial vegetation carbon uptake, represented by net primary productivity (NPP), particularly...
Understory functional trait adaptation to climate change is primarily mediated by soil conditions under long-term afforestation on the Loess Plateau
August 2026
Soil and climate conditions drive plant trait variation in natural ecosystems. However, afforestation induces rapid and significant shifts in these environmental drivers. Yet the extent to which such...
Unveiling the climatic tolerance and refugia potential of Abies cilicica Carr. through integrative niche modeling under climate change
August 2026
Understanding the climatic responses of regionally restricted species is essential for developing robust conservation strategies. This study focuses on Abies cilicica, an oro-Mediterranean fir species...
Contrasting responses of above- and belowground carbon stocks and arthropods in relation to forest management
August 2026
Forest ecosystems play a key role in mitigating both climate change and biodiversity loss, as they store large amounts of carbon and provide habitat for a diverse flora and fauna. However, for temperate...
Bryophytes as bioindicators in natural pine forests on mineral soils in Poland
August 2026
Although bryophytes are often underrepresented in vegetation classifications, our study demonstrates their crucial role in differentiating pine forest communities and highlights their untapped potential...
Effects of habitat fragmentation on multiple ecosystem functions in urban remnant forests
April 2026
Urbanization-driven habitat fragmentation threatens ecosystem multifunctionality (EMF) in remnant forests through biodiversity erosion. This study investigates the effects of habitat fragmentation on...
Facilitation by wood-boring beetles: Ecosystem engineering effects on soil macrofauna
August 2026
Deadwood is a critical component of ecosystems, contributing to long-term carbon sequestration, nutrient cycling, and biodiversity maintenance. As a spatially constrained and resource-rich habitat,...
Environmental heterogeneity regulates species-area relationships through the spatial distribution of species
2022
Species-area relationships (SARs), also known as species-area curves, are fundamental scaling tools for biodiversity research. Sampling design and taxonomic groups affect the widely cited forms of species-area...
Modeling adaptive growth in forest trees: Integrating individual variation to understand climate responses in widely-distributed species
August 2026
An improved understanding of how forest trees may respond individually and differentially to climate across broad environmental gradients, due to adaptation or physiological acclimation, may facilitate...
Aggregate-associated organic carbon regulates soil organic carbon during conversion from natural forest to Moso bamboo plantations and subsequent regeneration
August 2026
Forest conversion and management cessation can alter soil organic carbon (SOC) through changes in aggregates, minerals, and microbes, but it remains unclear how these factors jointly regulate SOC recovery...
Understanding flash drought variations in China's planted and natural forests through machine learning counterfactual analysis
August 2026
China's rapid forestation over the past decades has reshaped regional ecohydrology and raised concerns of intensifying drought. Here, we explore the historical drought variations and driving factors...
Elongated gaps provide a good compromise between abiotic and competitive conditions for sessile oak regeneration
August 2026
Continuous cover forestry is gaining importance in temperate forests as an alternative to rotation forestry. However, for light-demanding oaks, especially when coexisting with shade-tolerant tree species,...
Microbial life-history strategies regulate soil organic carbon formation and stability across soil depths during 300 years of the temperate forest succession
December 2026
Forest succession profoundly reshapes soil organic carbon (SOC) persistence, yet the depth-dependent microbial mechanisms governing particulate organic carbon (POC) and mineral-associated organic carbon...
Characterizing reference sites to inform restoration of the last remnants of the endangered Nothofagus alessandrii forest ecosystem
August 2026
The ecological restoration of threatened ecosystems is a global priority, particularly for those with only a few remaining intact fragments. A critical first step in restoring such ecosystems is the...
The effects of incubation temperature, incubation duration, and sample storage condition on the activity of β-1,4-glucosidase across different soil types
August 2026
Soil β-1,4-glucosidase is a key enzyme involved in microbial cellulose degradation and the terrestrial carbon cycle. However, reliable determination of its potential activity is often hampered by methodological...
The patterns of forest soil particulate and mineral associated organic carbon characteristics with latitude and soil depth across eastern China
April 2025
Forest ecosystems function as the largest carbon (C) sink in terrestrial ecosystems, and nearly half of the C in forest ecosystems is stored in forest soils. However, the patterns of two main fractions...
Patterns of decomposition rates in central European forests differ among carrion, leaf litter and deadwood
August 2026
Decomposition of dead organic matter is essential for ecosystem functioning and nutrient cycling, but carrion, leaf litter, and deadwood vary in their physicochemical characteristics, associated decomposer...
Neighborhood interactions and soil chemical properties co-regulate woody plant species diversity across different relative densities of arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM)-associated tree species in subtropical natural forests of southern China
August 2026
Mycorrhizal fungi play a functional role in nutrient absorption and transfer in ecosystems, influencing plant survival and interspecific interactions. However, it is unclear how different types of mycorrhizae...
The footprint of fire history on fuel structure strongly shapes fire severity in Mediterranean and Oceanic ecosystems of southern Europe
August 2026
Extreme wildfires are increasingly frequent across southern Europe, yet the extent to which fire history legacies modulate ecosystem-specific fire severity responses remains poorly understood in this...