Xylem anatomical responses to climate variability in Himalayan birch trees at one of the world’s highest forest limit

Abstract

Dear TRACE-participants, do you know Bruno Huber? One of the first scientists that introduced, refined and applied the method of dendrochronology and crossdating in Central Europe, the scholar who prepared and used thin sections to understand tree water transport over 90 years ago, the 'forward-thinker' who derived sapwood to leaf-area ratios in the 1920s today known as "Huber values"? Well, welcome to Greifswald! You are visiting the town and university, where Huber worked and taught early on in his career as a botanist, forester, plant physiologist, plant anatomist, and one of Europe's first dendrochronologists. At this conference, we have compiled diverse scientific conference sessions around the topics Bruno Huber explored successfully in his career. We are building on the foundations people like him carefully constructed. TRACE 2018 brings together students, senior scientists, scholars, and practitioners on topics spanning archaeology, plant and forest ecology, physiology, extreme events, climatology, wood anatomy and methodological advances of tree-ring science. We are happy to welcome more than 150 scientists from over 30 countries, contributing over 50 oral and over 80 poster presentations. Conferences such as TRACE 2018 are opportunities. Opportunities to exchange ideas and new developments, discuss with old colleagues and newcomers alike, the very core of our scientific endeavors. Let yourself and your thinking be "challenged", engage in constructive dialogue, network, observe, learn, and share your insights. We have big shoes to fill (see above)-we count on you. Last but not least-Have fun! Enjoy the old city of Greifswald and surroundings, the Baltic Sea coast, the experimental forest and the tree planting campaign and don't forget to qualify for the TRACE semifinals. Curious? Good-Let's start TRACE 2018. On behalf of the organizing team,

Effects of climate change on treeline trees in Sagarmatha (Mt. Everest, Central Himalaya)

“…These CRU meteorological data have been reported to correlate well with data of mean monthly temperatures and total monthly precipitation recorded at the Pyramid Research Station (at 5,050 m a. s. l. in the Khumbu Valley, Sagarmatha National Park, Nepal) of the Ev‐K2 (Centro Nazionale Ricerche – CNR, Italy) and NAST (Nepal Academy of Science and Technology, Nepal) institutes (Pandey et al. , 2018).…”

“…, 2014; Pandey et al. , 2018). On the contrary, it could also be questioned whether warmer oceans due to climate change anticipate the monsoon season (Loo and Billa, 2015), thus determining conditions of overall better water availability at the beginning of the growing season, with a positive stimulus for tree physiology and growth.…”

“…Consequently, the treeline shifts towards higher elevations can be limited by precipitation during the beginning of the vegetative season (Sigdel et al , 2018). Recent dendrochronological analyses on dominant tree species at the Central Himalayan treeline reported a positive effect of summer temperatures on tree growth, especially in Abies spectabilis (D.Don) Mirb., but also a certain degree of growth sensitivity to the amount of precipitation falling at the beginning of the growing season, especially in Betula utilis D.Don (Gaire et al , 2014; Pandey et al , 2018). Consequently, these studies raised the question whether conditions of pronounced air and soil dryness due to the low precipitation amounts during these periods of the year can potentially expose plants to drought stress, with negative effects on growth and seedlings establishment (Liang et al.…”

The Influence of Environmental Conditions on Secondary Metabolites in Medicinal Plants: A Literature Review

“…Change in temperature affects plant growth and metabolic pathways involved in signalling, physiological regulation and defence responses [44,45] . Temperature as major weather variables can significantly influence the composition of SMs with disruption in photosynthesis activities to tolerate stressful condition.…”

Drought Effects on Vessel Plasticity of Two Endemic <em>Magnolia</em> Species in the Tropical Montane Cloud Forests of Eastern Mexico

“…We deduce that drought induces increased hydraulic conductance with the consequence of high construction costs but reduced hydric transport efficiency and lower TRW growth rates (Figure 3 and 4) [13,24]. species maintain their water transport functioning during the growing season [13,25,27,64,71,72]. In a TMCF, drought could affect which tree species prevail over time, perhaps creating less favorable conditions for trees with relatively harder wood and coriaceous leaves such as Magnolia schiedeana, which present a higher vulnerability to drought conditions than the lusher species that contribute to canopy cover such as M.…”