Functional traits and plasticity of Plant Functional Types (PFT) in experimental grasslands

• Antragstellerin: Professorin Dr. Nina Buchmann
• Fachliche Zuordnung: Ökologie und Biodiversität der Pflanzen und Ökosysteme
• Förderung: Förderung von 2002 bis 2009
• Projektkennung: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Projektnummer 5468999

This project research will focus on plant functional diversity and its implications for carbon, nutrient and water cycling by varying plant species richness. Interactions of plant ecophysiology, but also community ecology with ecosystem processes, and processes at the transition between the biosphere and the pedosphere will be studied. This study has the following objectives: (1) to quantify the effect of changing plant biodiversity on ecophysiological and biogeochemical processes, such as net carbon, nitrogen and cation sequestration in above-ground plant biomass as well as gaseous soil CO2 and NO losses in experimental grassland communities, (2) to investigate the underlying ecophysiological mechanisms that produce plant biodiversity effects, (3)to test the redundancy of different plant species within a functional group, (4) to compare ecophysiological responses of individual plant species to responses of grassland communities to varying environmental conditions, and (5) to determine the relationship between inter-annual variability of those ecosystem processes and plant biodiversity.

• DFG-Verfahren: Forschungsgruppen
• Teilprojekt zu: FOR 456: The role of Biodiversity for element cycling and trophic interactions: An experimental approach in a grassland community
• Internationaler Bezug: Schweiz