Ramona Heim, Institute of Landscape Ecology of the University of Münster in Germany, discusses her article: Arctic tundra ecosystems under fire – Alternative ecosystem states in a changing climate? Fire events in the tundra are becoming increasingly frequent, garnering more media attention. These fires strongly reshape the landscape; however, our understanding of tundra vegetation recovery…
Lily Dun, Western Sydney University in New South Wales, Australia, and The University of Queensland in Queensland, Australia, discusses her article: Do trait-growth relationships vary with plant age in fire-prone heathland shrubs? When we think about plant growth, we often assume that certain functional traits—such as wood density, leaf structure, or biomass allocation—determine how fast…
Kechang Niu, Nanjing University in China, discusses his article: Plant species loss reduces rare soil microbes through diversity effects amplified by multitrophic interactions Background A key reason for the flourishing of life on Earth is that diverse groups of organisms mutually thrive in changing environments. However, increasing evidence shows that we are suffering the sixth…
We’re delighted to announce that the winner of the 2024 Harper Prize is Karina Guo! The Harper Prize is awarded annually for the best paper published in the journal by an early career researcher. ‘Using machine learning to link climate, phylogeny and leaf area in eucalypts through a 50-fold expansion of leaf trait datasets’ Karina Guo, William K. Cornwell, Jason…
Margaret W. Simon, University of Kansas, USA, discusses her article: Fast-growing annual plants drive disease spillover in multi-host communities Infectious plant diseases affect hosts in natural, agricultural, and urban systems. Modeling studies can help predict these effects, but traditional disease models were developed for animal systems. These models are not well suited for plant disease…
Hang Wang, Southwest Forestry University, discusses his article: Leaf biomechanical traits predict litter decomposability As ecologists, we often focus on how plants grow, reproduce, and interact with their environment. However, what happens after a plant has lived its life? More specifically, how do leaves breakdown after they fall to the ground? This process, known as…
Camila Medeiros, University of California, Los Angeles, discusses her article: Simplification of woody plant trait networks among communities along a climatic aridity gradient Motivation Plants are enormously diverse across regions, even within specific ecosystems, and zooming in on individual plants, one finds great diversity among their traits. Variation of all kinds of traits can play…
2024 HARPER PRIZE SHORTLIST: For the next two weeks, we are featuring the articles shortlisted for the 2024 Harper Prize. The Harper Prize is an annual award for the best early career research paper published in Journal of Ecology. Rémi Bardou’s ‘Effects of cold water and aridity on Baja California mangrove survival and ecophysiological traits’ is one of those shortlisted for the…
2024 HARPER PRIZE SHORTLIST: For the next two weeks, we are featuring the articles shortlisted for the 2024 Harper Prize. The Harper Prize is an annual award for the best early career research paper published in Journal of Ecology. Lena Sachsenmaier’s ‘Forest growth resistance and resilience to the 2018–2020 drought depend on tree diversity and mycorrhizal type’ is one of those shortlisted…
2024 HARPER PRIZE SHORTLIST: For the next two weeks, we are featuring the articles shortlisted for the 2024 Harper Prize. The Harper Prize is an annual award for the best early career research paper published in Journal of Ecology. Haben Blondeel‘s ‘Tree diversity reduces variability in sapling survival under drought’ is one of those shortlisted for the award. About the paper: Forests…
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