![]() Carbon measurements taken in air, soil, water, and trees are notoriously difficult to reconcile, in part because of the different timescales on which the processes operate. The volume of data brought together for the analysis - by two dozen scientists from 11 institutions - is unprecedented, as is the consistency of the results. Photos by Marc-Andre Giasson and Sara Plisinski Postdoctoral fellow Tim Rademacher and student researcher Kyle Wyche measure the respiration of an oak tree at Harvard Forest. “It is remarkable that changes in climate and atmospheric chemistry within our own lifetimes have accelerated the rate at which forest are capturing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere,” says Adrien Finzi, professor of biology at Boston University and a co-lead author of the study.Īn automated soil respiration chamber measures carbon dioxide emitted by the soil as plant roots and microscopic organisms use energy. Trees have also been growing faster due to regional increases in precipitation and atmospheric carbon dioxide, while decreases in atmospheric pollutants such as ozone, sulfur, and nitrogen have reduced forest stress. The scientists attribute much of the increase in storage capacity to the growth of 100-year-old oak trees, still vigorously rebounding from colonial-era land clearing, intensive timber harvest, and the 1938 Hurricane - and bolstered more recently by increasing temperatures and a longer growing season due to climate change. The study, published today in Ecological Monographs, reveals that the rate at which carbon is captured from the atmosphere at Harvard Forest nearly doubled between 19. ![]() Climate change has increased the productivity of forests, according to a new study that synthesizes hundreds of thousands of carbon observations collected over the last quarter century at the Harvard Forest Long-Term Ecological Research site, one of the most intensively studied forests in the world.
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