ABSTRACT
Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology and Department of Earth System Science, University of California, Irvine, California, USA
36.1 INTRODUCTION
Effects of elevated atmospheric CO
on ecosystems have been fairly well studied within the past few decades. At this point, certain general responses have become apparent, including an approximate 30% augmentation of plant productivity (Poorter, 1993), increases in root:shoot ratio (Bazzaz, 1990; Rogers et al., 1994), reduction of stomatal conductance (Jackson et al., 1994; Field et al., 1995; Medlyn et al., 2001), and shifts in plant communities (Ehleringer et al., 1997). This knowledge enables us to improve our predictions of ecosystem function under future environmental conditions expected within this century. Moreover, by exposing organisms to perturbations in the environment and examining how they respond, we can learn much about their basic ecology. For example, we can delineate functional groups and niches, and examine species interactions under different conditions. Therefore, global change research has implications for both applied and basic science, and our understanding of plant ecology has improved considerably as a result of this focus.
