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| Titel |
The Soil-Plant-Atmosphere Continuum of Mangroves: A Simple Ecohydrological model |
| VerfasserIn |
Saverio Perri, Francesco Viola, Leonardo Valerio Noto, Annalisa Molini |
| Konferenz |
EGU General Assembly 2016
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| Medientyp |
Artikel
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| Sprache |
en
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| Digitales Dokument |
PDF |
| Erschienen |
In: GRA - Volume 18 (2016) |
| Datensatznummer |
250131154
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| Publikation (Nr.) |
 EGU/EGU2016-11526.pdf |
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| Zusammenfassung |
| Mangroves represent the only forest able to grow at the interface between a terrestrial and a
marine habitat. Although globally they have been estimated to account only for 1% of carbon
sequestration from forests, as coastal ecosystems they account for about 14% of carbon
sequestration by the global ocean.
Despite the continuously increasing number of hydrological and ecological field
observations, the ecohydrology of mangroves remains largely understudied. Modeling
mangrove response to variations in environmental conditions needs to take into
account the effect of waterlogging and salinity on transpiration and CO2 assimilation.
However, similar ecohydrological models for halophytes are not yet documented in the
literature.
In this contribution we adapt a Soil-Plant-Atmosphere Continuum (SPAC) model to the
mangrove ecosystems. Such SPAC model is based on a macroscopic approach and the
transpiration rate is hence obtained by solving the plant and leaf water balance and the leaf
energy balance, taking explicitly into account the role of osmotic water potential and salinity
in governing plant resistance to water fluxes. Exploiting the well-known coupling of
transpiration and CO2 exchange through the stomatal conductance, we also estimate the CO2
assimilation rate. The SPAC is hence tested against experimental data obtained from the
literature, showing the reliability and effectiveness of this minimalist approach in reproducing
observed processes. Results show that the developed SPAC model is able to realistically
simulate the main ecohydrological traits of mangroves, indicating the salinity as
a crucial limiting factor for mangrove trees transpiration and CO2 assimilation. |
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