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Modeling the Response of Vegetation Distribution and Biodiversity to Climate Change

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Book cover Global Biodiversity in a Changing Environment

Part of the book series: Ecological Studies ((ECOLSTUD,volume 152))

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Abstract

The natural ecosystems of the world may be divided into a small set of biomes, each characterized by the dominance of one or more functional types of plants. At regional-to-global scales climate exerts a dominant influence over the distribution of these plant functional types (Woodward 1987). Smaller-scale variations in distribution may be controlled by smaller-scale features of the environment (e.g., soils and topography). Specific climatic controls on the distribution of these dominant plant functional types may be categorized as ecophysiological constraints, resource availability, and competition mediated by the effects of climate. Ecophysiological constraints on individual plant functional types account for the gross qualitative features of biome distribution, and such constraints have been incorporated into a number of rule-based vegetation models (Woodward 1987); (Neilson et al. 1992); (Prentice et al. 1992).

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Authors
  1. Martin T. Sykes
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  2. Alex Haxeltine
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Arctic Biology, University of Alaska, Fairbanks, AK, 99775, USA

    F. Stuart Chapin III

  2. Department of Ecology and IFEVA Faculty of Agronomy, University of Buenos Aires and CONICET, Buenos Aisres, 1417, Argentina

    Osvaldo E. Sala

  3. Departmento de Ingeniería Ambiental y Manejo de Recursos Naturales, Instituto Potosino de Investigaciones Científicas y Tecnológicas, San Luis Potosí, SLP, México

    Elisabeth Huber-Sannwald

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© 2001 Springer Science+Business Media New York

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Sykes, M.T., Haxeltine, A. (2001). Modeling the Response of Vegetation Distribution and Biodiversity to Climate Change. In: Chapin, F.S., Sala, O.E., Huber-Sannwald, E. (eds) Global Biodiversity in a Changing Environment. Ecological Studies, vol 152. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-0157-8_2

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4613-0157-8_2

  • Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY

  • Print ISBN: 978-0-387-95286-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-1-4613-0157-8

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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