FOR 456:  The Role of Biodiversity for Element Cycling and Trophic Interactions: An Experimental Approach in a Grassland Community

• Subject Area: Biology
• Term: from 2002 to 2008
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 5468999

The long-term experiment in Jena studies the interactions between plant diversity and ecosystem processes, focussing on element cycling and trophic interactions. 60 plant species, native and common to the Central European Arrhenatherum grasslands will serve as a species pool. Mixtures of one to 16 plant species and of one to four plant functional groups will be seeded as newly established communities on 20 m x 20 m plots. The species assemblages serve as basis to study interactions not only among plant individuals and plant species, but also between the different trophic levels (above-ground and below-ground invertebrates, soil microorganisms). In addition, special attention will be given to the ecosystem carbon balance and the turnover and loss of nutrients. The experimental design results from an international debate whether individual species, functional types or diversity per se determine ecosystem processes and to what extent diversity is vital for processes such as productivity, soil carbon storage, and groundwater quality. The present study is unique in comparison to previous experiments of this type with respect to
(1) the design of specific sub-experiments nested into the species diversity plots,
(2) the investigation of carbon storage,
(3) the study of full element cycles of N and P, and
(4) the focus on trophic interactions.

• DFG Programme: Research Units
• International Connection: Switzerland

Projects

• Aboveground plant community pattern and the role of plant traits for community processes (Applicant Roscher, Christiane )
• Carbon storage as a function of plant biodiversity (Applicant Gleixner, Gerd )
• Central Project (Applicants Schulze, Ernst-Detlef ;  Weisser, Wolfgang W. )
• Consumer - interaction webs and the effect of aboveground vertebrates and invertebrates on ecosystem processes (Applicant Weisser, Wolfgang W. )
• Coordination (Applicant Schulze, Ernst-Detlef )
• Decomposer - interaction webs and the effect of belowground biota for ecosystem processes (Applicants Buscot, Francois ;  Scheu, Stefan )
• Diversity and functions of arbuscular mycorrhizal and soil fungi with oxidative potential in grasslands with different levels of plant diversity (Applicant Buscot, Francois )
• Effect of plant diversity on ecosystem functions in grassland: the role of roots (Applicant Engels, Christof )
• Effect of small rodent activity on species composition and nutrient cycling in grassland communities (Applicant Halle, Ph.D., Stefan )
• Functional traits and plasticity of Plant Functional Types (PFT) in experimental grassland (Applicant Schmid, Bernhard )
• Functional traits and plasticity of Plant Functional Types (PFT) in experimental grasslands (Applicant Buchmann, Nina )
• Functional traits and plasticity of Plant Functional Types (PFT) in experimental grasslands (Applicant Schulze, Ernst-Detlef )
• Influence of plant water relation on ecosystem function and quantification of soil water fluxes for nutrient and carbon budgets (Applicants Attinger, Sabine ;  Büchel, Georg )
• Modelling biodiversity-ecosystem functioning relations in grasslands with special reference to mechanisms related to plasticity. (Applicant Wirth, Christian )
• Quantification of the hydrological cycle and assessment of spatial variability of soil water storage in a biodiversity experiment (Applicant Baade, Jussi )
• The effect of biodiversity on nutrient cycling in an experimental grassland (Applicant Wilcke, Wolfgang )
• The effects of ecosystem complexity and biodiversity on the expression of ecologically relevant genes in a model plant, Solanum nigrum (Applicant Baldwin, Ian Thomas )
• The interacting roles of plant pathogens, plant genetic variation, and individual plant fitness for the biodiversity-ecosystem functioning relationship in the Jena experiment (Applicant Fischer, Markus )
• The role of community assembly processes in biodiversity-ecosystems functioning experiments (Applicant Schulze, Ernst-Detlef )

• Spokesperson: Professor Dr. Wolfgang W. Weisser
• Deputy: Professor Dr. Ernst-Detlef Schulze