Boreal ecology articles within Nature Communications

Featured

• Article
  15 November 2023 | Open Access

  Tracking lake drainage events and drained lake basin vegetation dynamics across the Arctic

  The Arctic is dotted with lakes, including thermokarst lakes highly threatened by climate change. Here, the authors investigate 35 years of lake drainage events and related vegetation trends across the Arctic, finding differences between thermokarst and non-thermokarst lake drainage events.

  • Yating Chen
  • , Xiao Cheng
  •  & Chengxin Wang

• Article
  08 June 2023 | Open Access

  Northern expansion is not compensating for southern declines in North American boreal forests

  Boreal forests are expanding at high latitudes yet declining at their southern boundaries. Here, the authors show that such trends are not symmetrical in North America, where poleward expansion of boreal forests did not offset southern declines often linked to wildfires and logging.

  • Ronny Rotbarth
  • , Egbert H. Van Nes
  •  & Milena Holmgren

• Article
  08 June 2023 | Open Access

  Reassessment of growth-climate relations indicates the potential for decline across Eurasian boreal larch forests

  Tree growth in boreal forests is generally predicted to increase under warming. Here, the authors demonstrate a method to analyze physiologically informed temperature series of tree-ring data, finding potentially overlooked growth-temperature responses and projecting increasing risks of warming to boreal larch forests.

  • Wenqing Li
  • , Rubén D. Manzanedo
  •  & Neil Pederson

• Article
  03 November 2021 | Open Access

  Forest defoliator outbreaks alter nutrient cycling in northern waters

  Defoliating insects disrupt nutrient cycling of boreal catchments by redistributing carbon and nitrogen from forests to lakes. The resulting shift in lake biogeochemistry exceeds broader between-year trends observed across the boreal and north temperate region.

  • Samuel G. Woodman
  • , Sacha Khoury
  •  & Andrew J. Tanentzap

• Article
  01 May 2020 | Open Access

  Fire deficit increases wildfire risk for many communities in the Canadian boreal forest

  A primary element of modern wildfire management is to aggressively suppress small fires before they become large, but benefits can be offset by the fact that these practices promote older forests that are more ‘flammable’. Here the authors show that this downside puts numerous human communities at elevated risk of fires in boreal Canada.

  • Marc-André Parisien
  • , Quinn E. Barber
  •  & Sean A. Parks

• Article
  04 September 2019 | Open Access

  Plant roots increase both decomposition and stable organic matter formation in boreal forest soil

  Understanding mechanisms of soil organic matter (SOM) decomposition and stabilisation improves soil-climate feedback predictions. Here the authors show that roots in boreal forest promote organic nitrogen economy and provide a framework on how roots affect decomposition and stabilisation of SOM.

  • Bartosz Adamczyk
  • , Outi-Maaria Sietiö
  •  & Jussi Heinonsalo

• Article
  10 December 2018 | Open Access

  Northern forest tree populations are physiologically maladapted to drought

  Northern tree populations may not benefit under climate change, with implications for assisted migration and range expansion. Here, Isaac-Renton et al. show that leading-edge lodgepole pine populations have fewer characteristics of drought-tolerance, so may not adapt to tolerate drier conditions.

  • Miriam Isaac-Renton
  • , David Montwé
  •  & Kerstin Treydte

• Article
  02 August 2018 | Open Access

  Wildfire as a major driver of recent permafrost thaw in boreal peatlands

  Future permafrost thaw may be underestimated unless effects of wildfire are considered. Here the authors show that wildfires in boreal permafrost peatlands influence soil temperature and seasonal thaw depth for several decades, and increase the rate of complete permafrost thaw along permafrost edges.

  • Carolyn M. Gibson
  • , Laura E. Chasmer
  •  & David Olefeldt

• Article
  22 February 2018 | Open Access

  Landscape topography structures the soil microbiome in arctic polygonal tundra

  The role of ecosystem structure in microbial activity related to greenhouse gas production is poorly understood. Here, Taş and colleagues show that microbial communities and ecosystem function vary across fine-scale topography in a polygonal tundra.

  • Neslihan Taş
  • , Emmanuel Prestat
  •  & Janet K. Jansson

• Article | 26 June 2014

  Differentiating moss from higher plants is critical in studying the carbon cycle of the boreal biome

  Satellite-derived indices used to estimate gross primary production and carbon cycling rarely differentiate between boreal mosses and vascular plants, despite differences in photosynthetic capacity. Here, the authors show that this may have led to an overestimation of the boreal carbon budget.

  • Wenping Yuan
  • , Shuguang Liu
  •  & Timo Vesala

• Article | 13 December 2013

  Increases in terrestrially derived carbon stimulate organic carbon processing and CO₂ emissions in boreal aquatic ecosystems

  Recent increases in the dissolved organic carbon (DOC) content of northern aquatic systems are likely to lead to increases in CO₂ emissions, yet the mechanisms are poorly understood. Here, evidence from hundreds of Canadian aquatic systems suggests a causal link between DOC concentrations and CO₂flux.

  • Jean-François Lapierre
  • , François Guillemette
  •  & Paul A. del Giorgio