Understanding forest dynamics by integrating age and environmental change.

Area of Science:

• Forestry and Ecology
• Climate Change Science

Background:

• Forest carbon sequestration is influenced by post-disturbance regrowth and environmental changes (e.g., increased CO2, nitrogen deposition, climate change).
• Regrowth and environmentally modified growth processes often occur concurrently but are typically studied and assessed independently using additive approaches.

Purpose of the Study:

• To develop and present a novel framework for integrating forest regrowth and environmentally modified growth to better understand forest carbon dynamics.
• To evaluate the joint effects of disturbance recovery and environmental change on carbon sequestration.

Main Methods:

• Utilizing an interactive approach with hierarchical models to analyze concurrent growth processes.
• Leveraging newly available global forest age data to inform the age-based hierarchical framework.

Main Results:

• Hierarchical models offer a feasible method to integrate regrowth and modified growth, addressing their concurrent nature.
• The age-based framework provides a coherent approach to understanding the combined influences on forest carbon accumulation.

Conclusions:

• An integrated, interactive approach using hierarchical models is superior to additive methods for assessing forest carbon sequestration.
• The developed age-based hierarchical framework offers a robust method for studying forest dynamics and carbon cycling in response to disturbance and environmental change.