Find research datasets worth reusing

opencc-zeroFeb 2023View details →

Data for: Local adaptation of switchgrass drives trait relations to yield and differential responses to climate and soil environments

Switchgrass, a potential biofuel crop, is a genetically diverse species with phenotypic plasticity enabling it to grow in a range of environments. Two primary divergent ecotypes, uplands and lowlands, exhibit trait combinations representative of acquisitive and conservative growth allocation strategies, respectively. Whether these ecotypes respond differently to various types of environmental drivers remains unclear but is crucial to understanding how switchgrass varieties will respond to climate change. We grew two upland, two lowland, and two intermediate/hybrid cultivars of switchgrass at three sites along a latitudinal gradient in the central United States. Over a 4-year period, we measured plant functional traits and biomass yields and evaluated genotype-by-environment (G´E) interaction effects by analyzing switchgrass responses to soil and climate variables. We found substantial evidence of G´E interactions on biomass yield, primarily due to deviations in the response of the southern lowland cultivar Alamo, which produced more biomass in hotter and drier environments relative to other cultivars. While lowland cultivars had the highest potential for yield, their yields were more variable year-to-year compared to other cultivars, suggesting greater sensitivity to environmental perturbations. Models comparing soil and climate principal components as explanatory variables revealed soil properties, especially nutrients, to be most effective at predicting switchgrass biomass yield. Also, conservative plant traits such as high stem mass and tiller height became increasingly positively associated with biomass yield at lower latitudes where the climate is hotter and drier, regardless of ecotype. Lowland cultivars, however, showed a greater predisposition to exhibit these conservative traits. These results suggest switchgrass trait allocation trade-offs that prioritize aboveground biomass production are more tightly associated in hot, dry environments and that lowland cultivars may exhibit a more specialist life strategy relative to other cultivars. Altogether, this research provides essential knowledge for improving the viability of switchgrass as a biofuel crop.

opencc-by-4.0Jan 2023View details →

Processed CMIP6 data for "The climate response to the Mt Pinatubo eruption does not constrain climate sensitivity"

Processed CMIP6 output for Pauling et al. "The climate response to the Mt Pinatubo eruption does not constrain climate sensitivity" submitted to Geophysical Research Letters in 2023. Download this code repository: https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7553024 and follow the instructions in the README to download data and reproduce the results of the paper.

Data for: Phenotypic plasticity increases exposure to extreme climatic events that reduce individual fitness

Climate models, and empirical observations, suggest that anthropogenic climate change is leading to changes in the occurrence and severity of extreme climatic events (ECEs). Effects of changes in mean climate on phenology, movement, and demography in animal and plant populations are well documented. In contrast, work exploring the impacts of ECEs on natural populations is less common, at least partially due to the challenges of obtaining sufficient data to study such rare events. Here, we assess the effect of changes in ECE patterns in a long-term study of great tits, near Oxford, over a 56-year period between 1965 and 2020. We document marked changes in the frequency of temperature ECEs, with cold ECEs being twice as frequent in the 1960s than at present, and hot ECEs being ~three times more frequent between 2010 and 2020 than in the 1960s. While the effect of single ECEs was generally quite small, we show that increased exposure to ECEs often reduces reproductive output, and that in some cases, the effect of different types of ECE is synergistic. We further show that long-term temporal changes in phenology, resulting from phenotypic plasticity, lead to an elevated risk of exposure to low-temperature ECEs early in reproduction, and hence suggest that changes in ECE exposure may act as a cost of plasticity. Overall, our analyses reveal a complex set of risks of exposure and effects as ECE patterns change and highlight the importance of considering responses to changes in both mean climate and extreme events. Patterns in exposure and effects of ECEs on natural populations remain underexplored and continued work will be vital to establish the impacts of ECEs on populations in a changing climate.

opencc-zeroDec 2022View details →

Data for: Implications of climate change for biocontrol efficacy across the northern range of the invasive plant Linaria dalmatica

The effect of insect biological control agents on invasive plant populations can vary spatially, and spatial variation in climate may drive regional variation in herbivory, and thus biocontrol efficacy. Within host plant populations, local plant abundance can also be affected by the spatial distribution of herbivores, but whether local patterns persist at larger scales is less well understood. We examined how infestation and damage of the stem-mining weevil Mecinus janthiniformis, a specialist biocontrol agent of the invasive plant Linaria dalmatica, varied with and among populations across the northern edge of the range in North America. We quantified weevil and invasive plant densities, as well as plant fecundity, stem diameter and height across sites spanning an area of ~39,000 km2 in British Columbia, Canada. We found that specialist weevils did not respond to host plant density within sites across the study region. Instead, weevil attack and load were most sensitive to among-site variability in climate, with stems at warmer sites have four times as many weevils compared to stems at cooler sites. Weevils also reduced plant fecundity more at warmer sites, when controlled for plant size (stem diameter) with larger effects of weevils in thicker stems, indicating that L. dalmatica suppression is highest in warmer locations where weevils are more abundant and environmental conditions more favorable. Our results suggest that, with climate change, the efficacy of biocontrol for L. dalmatica will improve across the northern edge of the range. We recommend that at cooler sites, where biocontrols are less prevalent and effects on plant fecundity are weaker, alternative management strategies are necessary at this time. Across invasive plant species more generally, future studies that establish the role of climate in variability in biocontrol efficacy long after introduction can improve management of invasive plants under climate change.

Data from: Reduced fire severity offers near-term buffer to climate-driven declines in conifer resilience across the western United States

The combination of increasing fire-caused tree mortality and warmer, drier post-fire conditions is making forests in the western United States (West) vulnerable to ecological transformation. Yet, the relative importance of and interactions between these drivers of forest change remain unresolved, particularly over upcoming decades. Here we assess how the interactive impacts of changing climate and wildfire activity influenced conifer regeneration after 334 wildfires, using a novel dataset of post-fire conifer regeneration from 10,230 field plots. Our findings highlight declining regeneration capacity across the West over the past four decades for the eight dominant conifer species studied. Post-fire regeneration is sensitive to high-severity fire, which limits seed availability, and post-fire climate, which influences seedling establishment and survival. In the near-term, projected differences in recruitment probability between low- and high-severity fire scenarios were larger than projected impacts of climate change for most species, suggesting that reductions in fire severity, and resultant impacts on seed availability, could partially offset expected climate-driven declines in post-fire regeneration. Across 40–42% of the study area, we project post-fire conifer regeneration to be likely following low-severity but not high-severity fire under future climate scenarios (2031–2050). However, increasingly warm, dry climate conditions are projected to eventually outweigh the influence of fire severity and seed availability. The percent of the study area considered unlikely to experience conifer regeneration, regardless of fire severity, increased from 5% in 1981–2000 to 26–31% by mid-century, highlighting a limited time window over which management actions that reduce fire severity may effectively support post-fire conifer regeneration.

Model output data for 3D Climate modelling of LP 890-9 c with a modern Venus-like atmosphere

We make available the output data from 3D climate modelling of LP 890-9 c with a modern Venus-like atmosphere. The data here has been produced for the publication submitted to Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society: Letters under the title: «3D Global Climate Model of an Exo-Venus: a modern Venus-like Atmosphere for the Nearby Super-Earth LP 890-9 c». The data includes the temperature profiles, emission (thermal) phase curves and transmission spectra files calculated for JWST/NIRSpec Prism. We also make available larger versions of the synthetic observable figures. Proper credit should be given to the authors. For further information, please get in touch with the corresponding author (Diogo Quirino) at: dfquirino@fc.ul.pt

Data for: Climatic oscillation promoted diversification of spinous assassin bugs during Pleistocene glaciation

Insect speciation is among the most fascinating topics in evolutionary biology; however, its underlying mechanisms remain unclear. Allopatric speciation represents one of the major types of speciation and is believed to have frequently occurred during glaciation periods, when climatic oscillation may have caused suitable habitats to be fragmented repeatedly, creating geographical isolation among populations. However, supporting evidence for allopatric speciation of insects in East Asia during the Pleistocene glaciation remains lacking. We aim to investigate the effect of climatic oscillation during the Pleistocene glaciation on the diversification pattern and evolutionary history of hemipteran insects and to test the hypothesis of Pleistocene species stability using spinous assassin bugs Sclomina (Hemiptera: Reduviidae), a small genus widely distributed in southern China but was lately found to have cryptic species diversity. Here, using the whole mitochondrial genome (mitogenome) and nuclear ribosomal RNA genes, we investigated both interspecific and intraspecific diversification patterns of spinous assassin bugs. Approximate Bayesian computation, ecological niche modeling and demographic history analyses were also applied to understand the diversification process and driven factors. Our data suggest that the five species of Sclomina are highly diverged, despite three of them currently being cryptic. Speciation occurred during Pleistocene when suitable distribution areas were possibly fragmentated. Six phylogeographic groups in the type species S. erinacea were identified, among which two groups underwent expansion during early Last Glacial Period and after Last Glacier Maximum. Our analyses suggest that this genus may have experienced climate-driven habitat fragmentation and post-glacial expansion in the Pleistocene, promoting allopatric speciation and intraspecific diversification. Our results reveal underestimated species diversity in a small insect group and illustrate a remarkable example of allopatric speciation of insects in East Asia promoted by Pleistocene climatic oscillations. These findings provide important insights into the speciation processes and aid the conservation of insect species diversity.

Supplementary data to: Grassland greening and water resource availability may coexist in a warming climate

This data archive includes the boundary of the North China and Tibetan Plateau (NCTP), three sub-regions, and respective province, the CLCD landcover in 2020, annual PM ET in 1982, and trends in projected water yield and leaf area index by the end of the 21st century (up to 2100). The boundary of the NCTP, three sub-regions, and respective province is in the shapefile (.shp) format, and other processed data are in the geotiff (.tif) or in the mat format. For calculation details please see the publication.

Output data: China's energy-water-land system co-evolution under carbon neutrality goal and climate impacts

Outputs for Wang, J., Duan, Y., Wang, C., 2023. China’s energy-water-land system co-evolution under carbon neutrality goal and climate impacts. (In progress) Folder demeter contains the spatially downscaled land use/land cover datasets. Folder tethys contains the spatially downscaled water withdrawal datasets. The sub-folder names correspond to the scenarios described in the paper. For landcover datasets, land type ratios in each grid are presented. Land types include water, forest, shrub, grass, urban, snow, sparse and crops. For water withdrawal datasets, “wd” = “water withdrawal spatially downscaled”, “twd” = “water withdrawal spatially and temporally downscaled”, “dom”=”domestic/municipal sector”, “elec”=”electricity sector”, ”irr”=”irrigation sector”, “liv”=”livestock sector”, “mfg”=”manufacturing/industry sector”, “min”=”mining/primary energy sector”, “nonag”=”non-agricultural sector”, “total”=”all sectors”.

King's College Cambridge wildflower meadow monitoring data: biodiversity, climate change and society

The biodiversity and climate crises are critical challenges of this century. Wildflower meadows in urban areas could provide important nature-based solutions, addressing the biodiversity and climate crises jointly, and benefitting society in the process. King's College Cambridge (England, UK) established a wildflower meadow over a portion of its iconic Back Lawn in 2019, replacing a fine lawn first laid in 1772. We used biodiversity surveys, Wilcoxon signed rank, and ANOVA models to compare species richness, abundance, and composition of plants, spiders, bugs, bats, and nematodes supported by the meadow, and remaining lawn, over three years. We estimated the climate change impact of meadow vs lawn from maintenance emissions, soil carbon sequestration, and reflectance effect. We surveyed members of the university to quantify the societal benefits of, and attitudes towards, increased meadow planting on the collegiate university estate. In spite of its small size (0.36 ha), the meadow supported approximately three times more plant species, three times more spider and bug species and individuals, and bats were recorded three times more often over the meadow than the remaining lawn. Terrestrial invertebrate biomass was 25 times higher in the meadow compared with the lawn. Fourteen species with conservation designations were recorded on the meadow (six for lawn), alongside meadow specialist species. Reduced maintenance and fertilising associated with meadow reduced emissions by an estimated 1.36 Mg CO2-e per hectare per year compared with lawn. Relative reflectance increased by 25-34% for meadow relative to lawn. Soil carbon stocks did not differ between meadow and lawn. Respondents thought meadows provided greater aesthetic, educational, and mental well-being services than lawns. In open responses, lawns were associated with undesirable elitism and social exclusion (most colleges in Cambridge restrict lawn access to senior members of the college), and respondents proved overwhelmingly in favour of meadow planting in place of lawns on the collegiate university estate. This study demonstrates the substantial benefits of small urban meadows for local biodiversity, cultural ecosystem services, and climate change mitigation, supplied at a lower cost than maintaining conventional lawn.

Case study result data set for Energy Systems (submitted) article "Influence of hydrogen import prices on hydropower systems in climate-neutral Europe"

The data set contains result data for the European system in a long term climate-neutral European energy system (scenario year 2050) as described in the publication "Influence of hydrogen import prices on hydropower systems in climate-neutral Europe". The results have been generated with the model SCOPE SD of Fraunhofer Institute for Energy Economics and Energy System Technology IEE.  Abbreviations: <ul> <li>BEV - Battery Electric Vehicles</li> <li>CCGT - Combined Cycle Gas Turbine</li> <li>CHP - Combined heat and power</li> <li>con - consumption</li> <li>gen - generation</li> <li>HighCLEQ - High import prices / clustered-equivalent hydropower units</li> <li>HighEQ - High import prices / equivalent hydropower units</li> <li>LowCLEQ - Low import prices / clustered-equivalent hydropower units</li> <li>LowEQ - Low import prices / equivalent hydropower units</li> <li>MedCLEQ - Medium import prices / clustered-equivalent hydropower units</li> <li>MedEQ - Medium import prices / equivalent hydropower units</li> <li>OCGT - Open Cycle Gas Turbine</li> <li>PHEV - Plug-In Hybrid Vehicles</li> <li>PS - Pumped Storage</li> <li>w/ - with</li> <li>w/o - without</li> <li>yr - year</li> </ul>

opencc-zeroDec 2022View details →

Data from: Climatic water availability mainly drives context-dependency of tree functional diversity effects on soil organic carbon storage in European forests

The interplay of forest stand and environmental factors shape soil organic C (SOC) storage in forest ecosystems but little is known about their relative impacts in different soil layers. Moreover, how environmental factors modulate the impact of stand factors, particularly species mixing, on SOC storage, is largely unexplored. In this study conducted in 21 forest triplets (two-species mixed stand and respective monocultures nearby) distributed in Europe, we tested the hypothesis that stand factors (functional identity and diversity) have stronger effects on topsoil (FF+0-10 cm) C storage than environmental factors (climatic water availability, clay+silt content, oxalate-extractable Al - Alox) but that the opposite occurs in the subsoil (10-40 cm). We also tested the hypothesis that functional diversity improves SOC storage under high climatic water availability, clay+silt contents, Alox. We characterized functional identity as the proportion of broadleaved species (beech and/or oak), and functional diversity as the product of broadleaved and conifer (pine) proportions. The results show that functional identity was the main driver of topsoil C storage while climatic water availability had the largest control on subsoil C storage. Contrary to expectations, functional diversity decreased topsoil C storage under increasing climatic water availability but the opposite was observed in the subsoil. Functional diversity effects on topsoil C increased with increasing clay+silt content, while its effects on subsoil C was negative at increasing Alox content. This suggests that functional diversity effect on SOC storage along environmental gradients depends on the specific environmental factor and the soil depth under consideration.

Data for: The indoor mycobiomes of daycare centers are affected by occupancy and climate

With an alarming increase in chronic diseases like childhood asthma and allergies, there is an increased focus on the exposure of young children to indoor biological and chemical air pollutants. Our study of 125 daycares throughout Norway demonstrates that the indoor mycobiome not only reflects cooccurring outdoor fungi but also includes a high abundance of yeast and mold fungi with an affinity for indoor environments.

opencc-zeroApr 2023View details →

Data from: Climate change consequences for differential adult survival and the mating system of a temperate breeding shorebird

Managing for the effects of climate change on species whose populations are currently imperiled requires detailed knowledge of the relationship between their demographic rates and climate variables. We sought this information for the West Coast breeding population of snowy plover (Charadrius nivosus), which was federally listed as threatened in 1993 due to substantial declines in the numbers of plovers breeding along the coast and in the number of sites occupied for breeding. Snowy plovers employ a serially polygamous breeding system in which the male typically tends chicks to independence. This unusual breeding system is favored by male-biased sex ratios in local populations. As part of a multi-species study of the effect of climate change on population growth, we used mark-capture models to examine climate drivers of adult survival for 1,219 snowy plovers banded at Monterey Bay over 38 years and known to overwinter on the surrounding north-central California outer coast. Non-climate variables, including sex and unmeasured annual mortality risks (e.g., predator abundance) were the primary factors affecting adult survival. However, there is evidence that cold weather, particularly extended cold snaps with daily low temperatures below 2˚C and daily high temperatures below 10˚C, decreases overwinter survival. Exceptionally cold winters had a particularly strong effect on adult female plovers, contributing to the male-biased adult sex ratios. Future winter climate on the north-central California coast is projected to be generally warmer with fewer and shorter cold snaps. Reduced mortality from cold winter weather may mitigate other threats faced by plovers, such as anthropogenically enhanced predator populations, habitat loss, and accelerated sea level rise, while altering the adult sex ratio and potentially shifting the evolutionary landscape maintaining the plover's unusual breeding system.

Data from: Climate overrides the influence of microsite conditions on radial growth of the tall multi-stemmed shrub Alnus alnobetula at treeline

Data are documented in the following article: Oberhuber W., A-L. Dobler, T. Heinzle, F. Scandurra, A. Gruber, G. Wieser (2023) Climate overrides the influence of microsite conditions on radial growth of the tall multi-stemmed shrub Alnus alnobetula at treeline. Plants 12, 1708. doi: 10.3390/plants12081708.   Summary: Green alder (Alnus alnobetula), a tall multi-stemmed deciduous shrub characterized by shoots showing arched ascending growth, is widespread at high elevations in the European Central Alps. Its growth form frequently leads to asymmetric radial growth and anomalous growth ring patterns making development of representative ring width series needed for analyzing climate-growth relationships or site-specific growth rates and long-term growth trends quite a challenge. In order to assess the variability among radii of one shoot, among shoots belonging to one individual (=stock) and among individuals, 60 stem discs were sampled at treeline on Mt. Patscherkofel (Tyrol, Austria). Annual increments were measured along 188 radii and analyzed in terms of its variability by applying dendrochronological techniques. Results revealed a high agreement in ring width variation among radii of one shoot, among shoots of one individual and largely among individuals from different sites, which confirms the pronounced limitation of radial stem growth by climate forcing at the alpine treeline. In contrast to this, a high variability in absolute growth rates and long-term growth trends was found among shoots belonging to one individual and among individuals, which we attribute to different microsite conditions and disturbances. These factors also override climate control of radial growth under growth limiting environmental conditions, i.e., the agreement in inter-annual variations of radial growth is directly related to the growth rate. Based on these findings we provide recommendations for the number of samples needed to carry out inter- and intra-annual studies of radial growth in this tall multi-stemmed shrub.

opencc-by-4.0Apr 2023View details →

Data accompanying "Diurnal variability of the upper ocean simulated by a climate model"

Data used for creating figures in the draft article "Diurnal variability of the upper ocean simulated by a climate model". This includes: <ul> <li>Multi-year, monthly mean diurnal cycle metrics at all model grid points.</li> <li>Monthly mean diurnal cycle data for individual years at selected locations.</li> </ul> Code used to create these data files, and to create the plots, is in a Github repository (https://github.com/JackReevesEyre/cfs-analysis-gaea/). The repository is also archived on Zenodo (https://doi.org/10.5281/zenodo.7846095).

opencc-zeroApr 2023View details →

Data from: Long-term grazing intensity by reindeer alters the response of the soil micro-food web to simulated climate change in subarctic tundra

Top-down control by nematodes over soil microorganisms – considered stronger over bacteria than fungi - may dampen microbial responses to global changes in tundra. To test whether large grazers alter the responses of belowground trophic networks to global changes, we employed factorial warming and nitrogen fertilization treatments in adjacent sites with different reindeer grazing intensities for the past 50 years. Lightly grazed tundra is dominated by dwarf shrubs and a more fungal-based microbial community, while in heavily grazed tundra, high reindeer densities during autumn migration have induced shift into graminoids and more bacterial-based microbial community. We analysed the soil micro-food web, i.e., the nematode density, trophic structure, and species composition as well as fungal, bacterial and total phospholipid fatty acids (PLFAs) after four growing seasons of warming and fertilization both before and during reindeer migration. We predicted that bacterivore densities are higher and fungivore densities lower under heavy than light grazing (i.e., nematode populations before migration reflect grazing effects via the base of food web), whereas reindeer migration induces negative impact on nematode densities under heavy grazing (i.e., disturbance by trampling is the driving factor). We further predicted that nematodes negate treatment effects on microbial biomass to a stronger extent in the bacterial-based heavily grazed than the fungal-based lightly grazed tundra. Fungivore densities were higher under light than heavy grazing, but nematodes did not respond to trampling. Warming increased fungivores and the fungal PLFAs irrespective of grazing and timing, but under heavy grazing, increased bacterivores while the bacterial PLFAs remained steady. Fertilization increased carnivores and influenced nematode species composition, diversity and maturity interactively with warming. Our data suggest that large grazers affect tundra soil nematodes via bottom-up effects through microbial community composition and biomass, which in turn may alter the strength of their top-down control soil bacteria under climate warming.

opencc-zeroMay 2023View details →

Data from: Environmental and climate variability drive population size of annual penaeid shrimp in a large lagoonal estuary

Species with short life spans frequently show a close relationship between population abundance and environmental variation making these organisms potential indicator species of climatic variability. White (Penaeus setiferus), brown (P. aztecus), and pink (P. duorarum) penaeid shrimp typically have an annual life history and are of enormous ecological, cultural, and economic value to the southeastern United States and Gulf of Mexico. Within North Carolina, all three species rely on the Pamlico Sound, a large estuarine system that straddles Cape Hatteras, one of the most significant climate and biogeographic breaks in the world, as a nursery area. These characteristics make penaeid species within the Pamlico Sound a critical species-habitat complex for assessing climate impacts on fisheries. However, a comprehensive analysis of the influence of the environmental conditions that influence penaeid shrimp populations has been lacking in North Carolina. In this study, we used more than 30 years of data from two fishery-independent trawl surveys in the Pamlico Sound to examine the spatial distribution and abundance of adult brown, white, and pink shrimp and the environmental drivers associated with adult shrimp abundance and juvenile brown shrimp recruitment using numerical models. Brown shrimp recruitment models demonstrate that years with higher temperature, salinity, offshore windstress, and North Atlantic Oscillation phase predict increased abundance of juveniles. Additionally, models predicting adult brown, white, and pink shrimp abundance illustrate the importance of winter temperatures, windstress, salinity, the North Atlantic Oscillation index, and the abundance of spawning adult populations from the previous year on shrimp abundance. Our findings show a high degree of variability in shrimp abundance is explained by climate and environmental variation and indicate the importance of understanding these relationships in order to predict the impact of climate variability within ecosystems and develop climate-based adaptive management strategies for marine populations.

opencc-zeroMay 2023View details →

Data for: The start of frozen dates over northern permafrost regions with the changing climate

The soil freeze-thaw cycle in the permafrost regions has a significant impact on regional surface energy and water balance. Although increasing efforts have been made to understand the responses of spring thawing to climate change, the mechanisms controlling the global interannual variability of the start date of permafrost frozen (SOF) remain unclear. Using long-term SOF from the combinations of multiple satellite microwave sensors between 1979–2020, and analytical techniques, including partial correlation, ridge regression, path analysis, and machine learning, we explored the responses of SOF to multiple climate change factors, including warming (surface and air temperature), start date of permafrost thawing (SOT), soil properties (soil temperature and volume of water), and the snow depth water equivalent (SDWE). Overall, climate warming exhibited the maximum control on SOF, but SOT in spring was also an important driver of SOF variability; among the 65.9% significant SOT and SOF correlations, 79.3% were positive, indicating an overall earlier thawing would contribute to an earlier frozen in winter. The machine learning analysis also suggested that apart from warming, SOT ranked as the second most important determinant of SOF. Therefore, we identified the mechanism responsible for the SOT-SOF relationship using the SEM analysis, which revealed that soil temperature change exhibited the maximum effect on this relationship, irrespective of the permafrost type. Finally, we analyzed the temporal changes in these responses using the moving window approach and found an increased effect of soil warming on SOF. Therefore, these results provide important insights into understanding and predicting SOF variations with future climate change.