Climate extremes have emerged as a crucial driver of changes in terrestrial ecosystems. The Tibetan Plateau, facing a rapid climate change, tends to favor climate extremes. But we lack a clear understanding of the imp...Climate extremes have emerged as a crucial driver of changes in terrestrial ecosystems. The Tibetan Plateau, facing a rapid climate change, tends to favor climate extremes. But we lack a clear understanding of the impacts of such extremes on alpine grasslands. Here we show that extreme events(drought,extreme wet, extreme cold and extreme hot) occurred at a frequency of 0.67–4 months decade^(-1) during2001–2015, with extreme precipitation predominantly occurring in June-to-August and extreme temperatures in May. Drought and extreme wet cause opposite and asymmetric effects on grassland growth,with drought-induced reductions greater than increases due to extreme wet. Grassland responses to extreme temperatures, which predominantly occur in May, show a dipole-like spatial pattern, with extreme hot(cold) events enhanced(reduced) growth in the eastern plateau but slightly reduced(enhanced) growth in the western plateau. These opposite responses to extreme temperatures over the eastern plateau are explained by the possibility that the occurrence of extreme cold slows the preseason temperature accumulation, delaying the triggering of spring phenology, while extreme hot hastens the accumulation. In the western plateau, in contrast, positive responses to extreme cold are induced by accompanying high precipitation. Furthermore, high extremeness of climate events generally led to a much lower extremeness in growth response, implying that the Tibetan grasslands have a relatively high resistance to climate extremes. The ecosystem models tested could not accurately simulate grassland responses to drought and extreme temperatures, and require re-parameterization before trust can be placed in their output for this region.展开更多
基金supported by the Strategic Priority Research Program (A) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (XDA20050101)the National Natural Science Foundation of China (41530528, 41871104)+3 种基金the Chinese Postdoctoral Science Foundation Project (Y7Gc011012)the Key Research and Development Programs for Global Change and Adaptation (2017YFA0603604)the Second Tibetan Plateau Scientific Expedition and Research (STEP) Projectthe Thousand Youth Talents Plan Project in China
文摘Climate extremes have emerged as a crucial driver of changes in terrestrial ecosystems. The Tibetan Plateau, facing a rapid climate change, tends to favor climate extremes. But we lack a clear understanding of the impacts of such extremes on alpine grasslands. Here we show that extreme events(drought,extreme wet, extreme cold and extreme hot) occurred at a frequency of 0.67–4 months decade^(-1) during2001–2015, with extreme precipitation predominantly occurring in June-to-August and extreme temperatures in May. Drought and extreme wet cause opposite and asymmetric effects on grassland growth,with drought-induced reductions greater than increases due to extreme wet. Grassland responses to extreme temperatures, which predominantly occur in May, show a dipole-like spatial pattern, with extreme hot(cold) events enhanced(reduced) growth in the eastern plateau but slightly reduced(enhanced) growth in the western plateau. These opposite responses to extreme temperatures over the eastern plateau are explained by the possibility that the occurrence of extreme cold slows the preseason temperature accumulation, delaying the triggering of spring phenology, while extreme hot hastens the accumulation. In the western plateau, in contrast, positive responses to extreme cold are induced by accompanying high precipitation. Furthermore, high extremeness of climate events generally led to a much lower extremeness in growth response, implying that the Tibetan grasslands have a relatively high resistance to climate extremes. The ecosystem models tested could not accurately simulate grassland responses to drought and extreme temperatures, and require re-parameterization before trust can be placed in their output for this region.