Aurora Levesley
A5017961793- Ecology and Vegetation Dynamics Studies
- Species Distribution and Climate Change
- Plant and animal studies
- Forest ecology and management
- Conservation, Biodiversity, and Resource Management
- Plant Water Relations and Carbon Dynamics
- Tree-ring climate responses
- Animal and Plant Science Education
- Fire effects on ecosystems
- Wildlife Ecology and Conservation
- Remote Sensing in Agriculture
- Diverse Educational Innovations Studies
- Nematode management and characterization studies
- Forest Ecology and Biodiversity Studies
- Plant tissue culture and regeneration
- Pineapple and bromelain studies
- Genetics, Bioinformatics, and Biomedical Research
- Remote Sensing and LiDAR Applications
- Plant nutrient uptake and metabolism
- Rangeland and Wildlife Management
- Soil Moisture and Remote Sensing
- Insect Resistance and Genetics
- Genetically Modified Organisms Research
- Rice Cultivation and Yield Improvement
- Innovations in Educational Methods
University of Leeds
2001-2025
University of Sussex
2001
Abstract The tropical forest carbon sink is known to be drought sensitive, but it unclear which forests are the most vulnerable extreme events. Forests with hotter and drier baseline conditions may protected by prior adaptation, or more because they operate closer physiological limits. Here we report that in South American climates experienced greatest impacts of 2015–2016 El Niño, indicating greater vulnerability temperatures drought. long-term, ground-measured tree-by-tree responses 123...
Abstract Rice (Oryza sativa) is sensitive to salinity, which affects one-fifth of irrigated land worldwide. Reducing sodium and chloride uptake into rice while maintaining potassium are characteristics that would aid growth under saline conditions. We describe genetic determinants the net quantity ions transported shoot, clearly distinguishing between quantitative trait loci (QTL) for in a shoot those affect concentration an ion shoot. The latter coincide with QTL vegetative (vigor) their...
The carbon sink capacity of tropical forests is substantially affected by tree mortality. However, the main drivers death remain largely unknown. Here we present a pan-Amazonian assessment how and why trees die, analysing over 120,000 representing > 3800 species from 189 long-term RAINFOR forest plots. While mortality rates vary greatly Amazon-wide, on average are as likely to die standing they broken or uprooted-modes with different ecological consequences. Species-level growth rate single...
Abstract Motivation Assessing biodiversity status and trends in plant communities is critical for understanding, quantifying predicting the effects of global change on ecosystems. Vegetation plots record occurrence or abundance all species co‐occurring within delimited local areas. This allows absences to be inferred, information seldom provided by existing datasets. Although many vegetation have been recorded, most are not available research community. A recent initiative, called ‘sPlot’,...
Significance The responses of tropical forests to heat and drought are critical uncertainties in predicting the future impacts climate change. 2015–2016 El Niño Southern Oscillation (ENSO) resulted unprecedented low precipitation across tropics, including very poorly studied African forest region. We assess ENSO using on-the-ground measurements. Across 100 long-term plots, record high temperatures did not significantly reduce carbon gains from tree growth or increase losses mortality....
Understanding the capacity of forests to adapt climate change is pivotal importance for conservation science, yet this still widely unknown. This knowledge gap particularly acute in high-biodiversity tropical forests. Here, we examined how Americas have shifted community trait composition recent decades as a response changes climate. Based on historical trait-climate relationships, found that, overall, studied functional traits show shifts less than 8% what would be expected given observed...
Abstract Wood density is a critical control on tree biomass, so poor understanding of its spatial variation can lead to large and systematic errors in forest biomass estimates carbon maps. The need understand how why wood varies especially tropical America where forests have exceptional species diversity turnover composition. As identity composition are challenging estimate remotely, ground surveys essential know the trees, whether measured directly or inferred from their identity. Here, we...
Societal Impact Statement Understanding of tropical forests has been revolutionized by monitoring in permanent plots. Data from global plot networks have transformed our knowledge forests’ diversity, function, contribution to biogeochemical cycles, and sensitivity climate change. Monitoring thus far concentrated rain forests. Despite increasing appreciation their threatened status, biodiversity, importance the carbon cycle, dry is still its infancy. We provide a protocol for plots Expanding...
We provide evidence from a 5-year study to show that single concerted effort at the start of undergraduate can have clear and lasting effect on attitudes students toward plant science. Attendance week-long residential science summer school in first year an degree resulted many changing courses include more increased numbers graduates selecting plant-based PhDs. The shows Gatsby Plant Science Summer School has pool high-quality related PhD applicants UK had positive impact students' career...
In this paper, we show how a single web resource can engage wide student audience with plant science. Developed by the University of Leeds, UK, Plant Science TREE (Tool for Research Engaged Education (www.tree.leeds.ac.uk)) is an online teaching tool giving access to research lectures, downloadable lecture slides, practicals, movies and other material on topical science support lecturers in their teaching. The complements annual Gatsby Summer School, which has already succeeded engaging...
The Plant Science TREE (Tool for Research Engaged Education) is an online teaching aid giving access to inspirational educational resources in the form of lectures, lecture slides, movies, practicals and images from research community, so that excitement potential plant science can be disseminated a wide student audience through educators worldwide.
A Correction to this paper has been published: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-20537-x