LTER: Ecosystem Transitions: Increased Variability and Regime Shifts
Project Description
Human impacts on ecosystems can result in persistent compositional shifts that are difficult to reverse even after relaxation from perturbations. Considerable debate remains on whether these observed shifts in ecosystems are due to the existence of tipping points and systems with alternative attractors, or whether observed shifts in ecosystems represent communities in alternative trajectories that will eventually reach a common stable point. However, in addition to human perturbations, ecosystems are also experiencing other transient dynamics, like climate variability, which could promote or prevent state shifts. Using cross-site synthesis of LTER experiments that have manipulated human perturbations or climate variability, we will test whether and which observed compositional shifts across the network are a result of critical transitions or transient dynamics. We will use this data to develop and inform theory that will allow us to make and test predictions on the magnitude and frequency of perturbations and climate variability needed to promote or prevent compositional shifts in ecosystems.
Principal Investigator(s)
Project Dates
Start: March 1, 2021
End: December 31, 2023
active
Participants
- Beatriz Aguirre
- Cornell University
- Lukas Bell-Dereske
- Czech Academy of Sciences
- Julien Brun
- University of California, Santa Barbara
- Angel Chen
- University of California, Santa Barbara
- Anny Chung
- University of Georgia
- Joan Dudney
- University of California
- Hanan Farah
- University of Minnesota
- Tadashi Fukami
- Stanford University
- Laureano A. Gherardi
- University of California, Berkeley
- Lauren M. Hallett
- University of Oregon
- David Hoover
- US Department of Agriculture (USDA)
- Forest Isbell
- University of Minnesota
- Nicholas J. Lyon
- University of California, Santa Barbara
- Kate J. Meyer
- Carleton College
- Maria Cristina Portales Reyes
- Saint Louis University
- Jennifer A. Rudgers
- University of New Mexico
- Katharine N. Suding
- University of Colorado, Boulder
- Carmen Watkins
- University of Oregon
- Megan Wilcots
- University of Minnesota