Rainfall Variability, Carbon Cycling, and Plant Species Diversity in a Mesic Grassland

• DOI: 10.1126/science.1076347
• Publication Date: 2002-12-12T21:05:01Z
• Authors: Alan K. Knapp; Philip A. Fay; John M. Blair; Scott L. Collins; Melinda D. Smith; Jonathan D. Carlisle; Christopher W. Ha...; Brett T. Danner; Michelle S. Lett; James K. McCarron
• Keywords: Cycling; Soil carbon

Ecosystem responses to increased variability in rainfall, a prediction of general circulation models, were assessed native grassland by reducing storm frequency and increasing rainfall quantity per during 4-year experiment. More extreme patterns, without concurrent changes total quantity, temporal soil moisture plant species diversity. However, carbon cycling processes such as CO2 flux, uptake the dominant grasses, aboveground net primary productivity (ANPP) reduced, ANPP was more responsive than mean water content. Our results show that projected increases can rapidly alter key community composition, independent precipitation.