-
Article
Open AccessWarming underpins community turnover in temperate freshwater and terrestrial communities
Rising temperatures are leading to increased prevalence of warm-affinity species in ecosystems, known as thermophilisation. However, factors influencing variation in thermophilisation rates among taxa and ecos...
-
Article
Open AccessBiogeochemical dynamics during snowmelt and in summer in the Alps
In alpine zones, soil microbial biomass and activity are strongly dependent on the seasonal snow cover. Current models assume that microbial biomass reaches an annual peak in winter under the insulating snowpa...
-
Chapter
Avalanches and Other Snow Movements
Together with rockfall, landslides, and debris flows, are among the most important gravitational natural hazards in mountain regions. On the one hand, forests perform important protective functions against t...
-
Article
Open AccessExperimental warming differentially affects vegetative and reproductive phenology of tundra plants
Rapid climate warming is altering Arctic and alpine tundra ecosystem structure and function, including shifts in plant phenology. While the advancement of green up and flowering are well-documented, it remains...
-
Article
Open AccessA common soil temperature threshold for the upper limit of alpine grasslands in European mountains
While climatic research about treeline has a long history, the climatic conditions corresponding to the upper limit of closed alpine grasslands remain poorly understood. Here, we propose a climatic definition ...
-
Article
Author Correction: Warming shortens flowering seasons of tundra plant communities
In the version of this Article originally published, the following sentence was missing from the Acknowledgements: “This work was supported by the Norwegian Research Council SnoEco project, grant number 230970...
-
Article
Warming shortens flowering seasons of tundra plant communities
Advancing phenology is one of the most visible effects of climate change on plant communities, and has been especially pronounced in temperature-limited tundra ecosystems. However, phenological responses have ...
-
Article
Plant functional trait change across a warming tundra biome
The tundra is warming more rapidly than any other biome on Earth, and the potential ramifications are far-reaching because of global feedback effects between vegetation and climate. A better understanding of h...
-
Article
Unchanged risk of frost exposure for subalpine and alpine plants after snowmelt in Switzerland despite climate warming
The length of the snow-free season is a key factor regulating plant phenology and sha** plant community composition in cold regions. While global warming has significantly advanced the time of snowmelt and t...
-
Article
Open AccessBiotic and abiotic drivers of tree seedling recruitment across an alpine treeline ecotone
Treeline responses to climate change ultimately depend on successful seedling recruitment, which requires dispersal of viable seeds and establishment of individual propagules in novel environments. In this stu...
-
Article
Accelerated increase in plant species richness on mountain summits is linked to warming
Globally accelerating trends in societal development and human environmental impacts since the mid-twentieth century1–7 are known as the Great Acceleration and have been discussed as a key indicator of the onset ...
-
Article
Responses of soil extracellular enzyme activities to experimental warming and CO2 enrichment at the alpine treeline
Climate warming and elevated CO2 can modify nutrient cycling mediated by enzymes in soils, especially in cold-limited ecosystems with a low availability of nutrients and a high temperature sensitivity of decompos...
-
Article
‘Hearing’ alpine plants growing after snowmelt: ultrasonic snow sensors provide long-term series of alpine plant phenology
In alpine environments, the growing season is severely constrained by low temperature and snow. Here, we aim at determining the climatic factors that best explain the interannual variation in spring growth ons...
-
Chapter
Non-equilibrium in Alpine Plant Assemblages: Shifts in Europe’s Summit Floras
Climate warming has been more pronounced in Arctic and alpine areas, and changes in the mountain flora can be expected as the temperature envelope moves upslope. On the one hand, alpine habitats will shrink du...
-
Article
Shorter snow cover duration since 1970 in the Swiss Alps due to earlier snowmelt more than to later snow onset
Global warming has strong impacts on snow cover, which in turn affects ecosystems, hydrological regimes and winter tourism. Only a few long-term snow series are available worldwide, especially at high elevatio...
-
Article
Small-scale drivers: the importance of nutrient availability and snowmelt timing on performance of the alpine shrub Salix herbacea
Alpine plant communities are predicted to face range shifts and possibly extinctions with climate change. Fine-scale environmental variation such as nutrient availability or snowmelt timing may contribute to t...
-
Article
Climate sensitivity of shrub growth across the tundra biome
Rapid climate warming has been linked to increasing shrub dominance in the Arctic tundra. Research now shows that climate–shrub growth relationships vary spatially and according to site characteristics such as...
-
Article
Faster, higher, more? Past, present and future dynamics of alpine and arctic flora under climate change
-
Article
Management, winter climate and plant–soil feedbacks on ski slopes: a synthesis
Owing to the increasing popularity of skiing and the upslope movement of the snow reliability line in mountain regions, more and more alpine environments are being turned into skiing areas, with strong impacts...
-
Article
An alpine treeline in a carbon dioxide-rich world: synthesis of a nine-year free-air carbon dioxide enrichment study
We evaluated the impacts of elevated CO2 in a treeline ecosystem in the Swiss Alps in a 9-year free-air CO2 enrichment (FACE) study. We present new data and synthesize plant and soil results from the entire exper...
