Basin-wide variation in tree hydraulic safety margins predicts the carbon balance of Amazon forests

Abstract

Tropical forests face increasing climate risk1,2 , yet our ability to predict their response to climate change is limited by poor understanding of their resistance to water stress. Although xylem embolism resistance thresholds (for example, Ψ50) and hydraulic safety margins (for example, HSM50) are important predictors of drought-induced mortality risk3–5 , little is known about how these vary across Earth’s largest tropical forest. Here, we present a pan-Amazon, fully standardized hydraulic traits dataset and use it to assess regional variation in drought sensitivity and hydraulic trait ability to predict species distributions and long-term forest biomass accumulation. Parameters Ψ50 and HSM50 vary markedly across the Amazon and are related to average long-term rainfall characteristics. Both Ψ50 and HSM50 infuence the biogeographical distribution of Amazon tree species. However, HSM50 was the only signifcant predictor of observed decadal-scale changes in forest biomass. Old-growth forests with wide HSM50 are gaining more biomass than are low HSM50 forests. We propose that this may be associated with a growth–mortality trade-of whereby trees in forests consisting of fast-growing species take greater hydraulic risks and face greater mortality risk. Moreover, in regions of more pronounced climatic change, we fnd evidence that forests are losing biomass, suggesting that species in these regions may be operating beyond their hydraulic limits. Continued climate change is likely to further reduce HSM50 in the Amazon6,7 , with strong implications for the Amazon carbon sink.

Metadata

Item Type:	Article
Authors/Creators:	Tavares, JV Oliveira, RS Mencuccini, M Signori-Müller, C Pereira, L Diniz, FC Gilpin, M Marca Zevallos, MJ Salas Yupayccana, CA Acosta, M Pérez Mullisaca, FM Barros, FDV Bittencourt, P Jancoski, H Scalon, MC Marimon, BS Oliveras Menor, I Marimon, BH Fancourt, M https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8980-2354 Chambers-Ostler, A Esquivel-Muelbert, A Rowland, L Meir, P Lola da Costa, AC Nina, A Sanchez, JMB Tintaya, JS Chino, RSC Baca, J Fernandes, L Cumapa, ERM Santos, JAR Teixeira, R Tello, L Ugarteche, MTM Cuellar, GA Martinez, F Araujo-Murakami, A Almeida, E da Cruz, WJA del Aguila Pasquel, J Aragāo, L Baker, TR https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3251-1679 de Camargo, PB Brienen, R https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5397-5755 Castro, W Ribeiro, SC Coelho de Souza, F Cosio, EG Davila Cardozo, N da Costa Silva, R Disney, M Espejo, JS Feldpausch, TR Ferreira, L Giacomin, L Higuchi, N Hirota, M Honorio, E Huaraca Huasco, W Lewis, S https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8066-6851 Flores Llampazo, G Malhi, Y Monteagudo Mendoza, A Morandi, P Chama Moscoso, V Muscarella, R Penha, D Rocha, MC Rodrigues, G Ruschel, AR Salinas, N Schlickmann, M Silveira, M Talbot, J Vásquez, R Vedovato, L Vieira, SA Phillips, OL https://orcid.org/0000-0002-8993-6168 Gloor, E Galbraith, DR https://orcid.org/0000-0002-5555-4823
Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information:	This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License, which permits use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons licence, and indicate if changes were made. The images or other third party material in this article are included in the article’s Creative Commons licence, unless indicated otherwise in a credit line to the material. If material is not included in the article’s Creative Commons licence and your intended use is not permitted by statutory regulation or exceeds the permitted use, you will need to obtain permission directly from the copyright holder. To view a copy of this licence, visit http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.
Dates:	Published: 4 May 2023 Published (online): 26 April 2023 Accepted: 17 March 2023
Institution:	The University of Leeds
Academic Units:	The University of Leeds > Faculty of Environment (Leeds) > School of Geography (Leeds) > Ecology & Global Change (Leeds)
Depositing User:	Symplectic Publications
Date Deposited:	17 May 2023 14:54
Last Modified:	17 May 2023 14:54
Published Version:	http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/s41586-023-05971-3
Status:	Published
Publisher:	Springer Science and Business Media LLC
Identification Number:	10.1038/s41586-023-05971-3
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID):	oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:199162

CORE (COnnecting REpositories)

Basin-wide variation in tree hydraulic safety margins predicts the carbon balance of Amazon forests

Abstract

Metadata

Download

Published Version

Export

Statistics