ISOCYCLE Marie Curie Team
Marie Curie Teams are independent young investigator research teams funded through a Marie Curie Excellence Grant of the European commission to support scientists at an early stage of their career (see ETH life news).
Context
Understanding the processes that control carbon and water flow through terrestrial ecosystems is essential both to estimate the current capacity of terrestrial ecosystems to absorb carbon from the atmosphere and to predict the ecosystems response under a changing climate. The Marie Curie Team Isocycle aimed to improve our understanding of these processes and to elucidate how environmental changes and climatic extreme events alter carbon and water flows and their interaction.
Methodologically, observational field work was combined with manipulative drought experiments as well as process-based ecosystem modeling. The regional focus was on forest ecosystems in Switzerland.
Approach
The key method employed was a recently developed quantum cascade laser spectrometer that allowed continuous measurements of stable carbon and oxygen isotopes in carbon dioxide in the field and in the laboratory.
Publications
2014
Barthel M, Sturm P, Hammerle A, Buchmann N, Gentsch L, Siegwolf R, Knohl A. A soil H218O labeling reveals the effect of drought on C18OO fluxes to the atmosphere. J. Exp. Botany 65(20): 5783-5793 doi:external page 10.1093/jxb/eru312
Gentsch L, Sturm P, Hammerle A, Siegwolf R, Wingate L, Ogeé J, Baur T, Plüss P, Barthel M, Buchmann N, Knohl A (2014) Carbon isotope discrimination during branch photosynthesis of Fagus sylvatica: Field measurements using laser spectrometry. Journal of Experimental Botany 65: 1481–1496 doi:external page 10.1093/jxb/eru024
Gentsch L, Hammerle A, Sturm P, Wingate L, Ogeé J, Siegwolf R, Barthel M, Plüss P, Baur T, Buchmann N, Knohl A (2014) Carbon isotope discrimination during branch photosynthesis of Fagus sylvatica: A Bayesian modeling approach. Plant, Cell & Environment 37: 1516–1535 doi:external page 10.1111/pce.12262