| 1. |
- Andersson-Sköld, Yvonne, et al.
(författare)
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A framework for assessing urban greenery's effects and valuing its ecosystem services
- 2018
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Ingår i: Journal of Environmental Management. - : Academic Press. - 0301-4797 .- 1095-8630. ; 205, s. 274-285
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Ongoing urban exploitation is increasing pressure to transform urban green spaces, while there is increasing awareness that greenery provides a range of important benefits to city residents. In efforts to help resolve associated problems we have developed a framework for integrated assessments of ecosystem service (ES) benefits and values provided by urban greenery, based on the ecosystem service cascade model. The aim is to provide a method for assessing the contribution to, and valuing, multiple ES provided by urban greenery that can be readily applied in routine planning processes. The framework is unique as it recognizes that an urban greenery comprises several components and functions that can contribute to multiple ecosystem services in one or more ways via different functional traits (e.g. foliage characteristics) for which readily measured indicators have been identified. The framework consists of five steps including compilation of an inventory of indicator; application of effectivity factors to rate indicators' effectiveness; estimation of effects; estimation of benefits for each ES; estimation of the total ES value of the ecosystem. The framework was applied to assess ecosystem services provided by trees, shrubs, herbs, birds, and bees, in green areas spanning an urban gradient in Gothenburg, Sweden. Estimates of perceived values of ecosystem services were obtained from interviews with the public and workshop activities with civil servants. The framework is systematic and transparent at all stages and appears to have potential utility in the existing spatial planning processes.
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| 2. |
- Alatalo, Juha M., et al.
(författare)
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Dominance hierarchies, diversity and species richness of vascular plants in an alpine meadow: Contrasting short and medium termresponses to simulated global change
- 2014
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Ingår i: PeerJ. - : PeerJ Inc.. - 2167-8359. ; 2014:1
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- We studied the impact of simulated global change on a high alpine meadow plant community. Specifically, we examined whether short-term (5 years) responses are good predictors for medium-term (7 years) changes in the system by applying a factorial warming and nutrient manipulation to 20 plots in Latnjajaure, subarctic Sweden. Seven years of experimental warming and nutrient enhancement caused dramatic shifts in dominance hierarchies in response to the nutrient and the combined warming and nutrient enhancement treatments. Dominance hierarchies in the meadow moved from a community being dominated by cushion plants, deciduous, and evergreen shrubs to a community being dominated by grasses, sedges, and forbs. Short-termresponses were shown to be inconsistent in their ability to predict medium-term responses for most functional groups, however, grasses showed a consistent and very substantial increase in response to nutrient addition over the seven years. The non-linear responses over time point out the importance of longer-term studies with repeated measurements to be able to better predict future changes. Forecasted changes to temperature and nutrient availability have implications for trophic interactions, and may ultimately influence the access to and palatability of the forage for grazers. Depending on what anthropogenic change will be most pronounced in the future (increase in nutrient deposits, warming, or a combination of them both), different shifts in community dominance hierarchies may occur. Generally, this study supports the productivity-diversity relationship found across arctic habitats, with community diversity peaking in mid-productivity systems and degrading as nutrient availability increases further. This is likely due the increasing competition in plant-plant interactions and the shifting dominance structure with grasses taking over the experimental plots, suggesting that global change could have high costs to biodiversity in the Arctic. © 2014 Alatalo et al.
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| 3. |
- Ali, A., et al.
(författare)
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Diversity-productivity dependent resistance of an alpine plant community to different climate change scenarios
- 2016
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Ingår i: Ecological Research. - : Wiley. - 0912-3814 .- 1440-1703. ; 31:6, s. 935-945
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Here we report from a experiment imposing different warming scenarios [control with ambient temperature, constant level of moderate warming for 3 years, stepwise increase in warming for 3 years, and one season of high level warming (pulse) simulating an extreme summer event] on an alpine ecosystem to study the impact on species diversity-biomass relationship, and community resistance in terms of biomass production. Multiple linear mixed models indicate that experimental years had stronger influence on biomass than warming scenarios and species diversity. Species diversity and biomass had almost humpback relationships under different warming scenarios over different experimental years. There was generally a negative diversity-biomass relationship, implying that a positive diversity-biomass relationship was not the case. The application of different warming scenarios did not change this tendency. The change in community resistance to all warming scenarios was generally negatively correlated with increasing species diversity, the strength of the correlation varying both between treatments and between years within treatments. The strong effect of experimental years was consistent with the notion that niche complementarity effects increase over time, and hence, higher biomass productivity over experimental years. The strongest negative relationship was found in the first year of the pulse treatment, indicating that the community had weak resistance to an extreme event of one season of abnormally warm climate. Biomass production started recovering during the two subsequent years. Contrasting biomass-related resistance emerged in the different treatments, indicating that micro sites within the same plant community may differ in their resistance to different warming scenarios.
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| 4. |
- Cornelissen, Johannes H C, et al.
(författare)
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Global negative vegetation feedback to climate warming responses of leaf litter decomposition rates in cold biomes
- 2007
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Ingår i: Ecology Letters. - : Wiley. - 1461-023X .- 1461-0248. ; 10:7, s. 619-627
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Whether climate change will turn cold biomes from large long-term carbon sinks into sources is hotly debated because of the great potential for ecosystem-mediated feedbacks to global climate. Critical are the direction, magnitude and generality of climate responses of plant litter decomposition. Here, we present the first quantitative analysis of the major climate-change-related drivers of litter decomposition rates in cold northern biomes worldwide.Leaf litters collected from the predominant species in 33 global change manipulation experiments in circum-arctic-alpine ecosystems were incubated simultaneously in two contrasting arctic life zones. We demonstrate that longer-term, large-scale changes to leaf litter decomposition will be driven primarily by both direct warming effects and concomitant shifts in plant growth form composition, with a much smaller role for changes in litter quality within species. Specifically, the ongoing warming-induced expansion of shrubs with recalcitrant leaf litter across cold biomes would constitute a negative feedback to global warming. Depending on the strength of other (previously reported) positive feedbacks of shrub expansion on soil carbon turnover, this may partly counteract direct warming enhancement of litter decomposition.
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| 5. |
- Alatalo, Juha M., et al.
(författare)
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Climate change and climatic events: community-, functional- and species-level responses of bryophytes and lichens to constant, stepwise, and pulse experimental warming in an alpine tundra
- 2014
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Ingår i: Alpine Botany. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1664-2201 .- 1664-221X. ; 124:2, s. 81-91
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- We experimentally imposed three different kinds of warming scenarios over 3 years on an alpine meadow community to identify the differential effects of climate warming and extreme climatic events on the abundance and biomass of bryophytes and lichens. Treatments consisted of (a) a constant level of warming with open top chambers (an average temperature increase of 1.87 A degrees C), (b) a yearly stepwise increase of warming (average temperature increases of 1.0; 1.87 and 3.54 A degrees C, consecutively), and (c) a pulse warming, i.e., a single first year pulse event of warming (average temperature increase of 3.54 A degrees C only during the first year). To our knowledge, this is the first climate change study that attempts to distinguish between the effects of constant, stepwise and pulse warming on bryophyte and lichen communities. We hypothesised that pulse warming would have a significant short-term effect compared to the other warming treatments, and that stepwise warming would have a significant mid-term effect compared to the other warming treatments. Acrocarpous bryophytes as a group increased in abundance and biomass to the short-term effect of pulse warming. We found no significant effects of mid-term (third-year) stepwise warming. However, one pleurocarpous bryophyte species, Tomentypnum nitens, generally increased in abundance during the warm year 1997 but decreased in control plots and in response to the stepwise warming treatment. Three years of experimental warming (all treatments as a group) did have a significant impact at the community level, yet changes in abundance did not translate into significant changes in the dominance hierarchies at the functional level (for acrocarpous bryophytes, pleurocarpous bryophytes, Sphagnum or lichens), or in significant changes in other bryophyte or lichen species. The results suggest that bryophytes and lichens, both at the functional group and species level, to a large extent are resistant to the different climate change warming simulations that were applied.
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| 6. |
- Alatalo, Juha M., et al.
(författare)
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Vascular plant abundance and diversity in an alpine heath under observed and simulated global change
- 2015
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Ingår i: Scientific Reports. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 2045-2322. ; 5
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Global change is predicted to cause shifts in species distributions and biodiversity in arctic tundra. We applied factorial warming and nutrient manipulation to a nutrient and species poor alpine/arctic heath community for seven years. Vascular plant abundance in control plots increased by 31%. There were also notable changes in cover in the nutrient and combined nutrient and warming treatments, with deciduous and evergreen shrubs declining, grasses overgrowing these plots. Sedge abundance initially increased significantly with nutrient amendment and then declined, going below initial values in the combined nutrient and warming treatment. Nutrient addition resulted in a change in dominance hierarchy from deciduous shrubs to grasses. We found significant declines in vascular plant diversity and evenness in the warming treatment and a decline in diversity in the combined warming and nutrient addition treatment, while nutrient addition caused a decline in species richness. The results give some experimental support that species poor plant communities with low diversity may be more vulnerable to loss of species diversity than communities with higher initial diversity. The projected increase in nutrient deposition and warming may therefore have negative impacts on ecosystem processes, functioning and services due to loss of species diversity in an already impoverished environment.
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| 7. |
- Jägerbrand, Annika K, 1972-, et al.
(författare)
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Effects of neighboring vascular plants on the abundance of bryophytes in different vegetation types
- 2012
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Ingår i: Polar Science. - Oxford : Elsevier BV. - 1873-9652 .- 1876-4428. ; 6:2, s. 200-208
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Due to the climate change, vegetation of tundra ecosystems is predicted to shift toward shrub and tree dominance, and this change may influence bryophytes. To estimate how changes in growing environment and the dominance of vascular plants influence bryophyte abundance, we compared the relationship of occurrence of bryophytes among other plant types in a five-year experiment of warming (T), fertilization (F) and T + F in two vegetation types, heath and meadow, in a subarctic–alpine ecosystem. We compared individual leaf area among shrub species to confirm that deciduous shrubs might cause severe shading effect. Effects of neighboring functional types on the performance of Hylocomium splendens was also analyzed. Results show that F and T + F treatments significantly influenced bryophyte abundance negatively. Under natural conditions, bryophytes in the heath site were negatively related to the abundance of shrubs and lichens and the relationship between lichens and bryophytes strengthened after the experimental period. After five years of experimental treatments in the meadow, a positive abundance relationship emerged between bryophytes and deciduous shrubs, evergreen shrubs and forbs. This relationship was not found in the heath site. Our study therefore shows that the abundance relationships between bryophytes and plants in two vegetation types within the same area can be different. Deciduous shrubs had larger leaf area than evergreen shrubs but did not show any shading effect on H. splendens.
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| 8. |
- Sand, Emilia, et al.
(författare)
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Effects of ground surface permeability on the growth of urban linden trees
- 2018
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Ingår i: Urban Ecosystems. - : Springer. - 1083-8155 .- 1573-1642. ; 21, s. 691-696
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Street trees are an important part of urban vegetation due to their provisioning of different types of ecosystem services such as local climate regulation and contribution to aesthetical and recreational values. In order to provide these services, urban trees need to endure many stress factors not present in natural environments, such as the widespread use of impervious surfaces in the vicinity of street trees. However, few studies have evaluated the effect of this potential stress factor on urban tree growth. The aim of this study was therefore to investigate how ground surface permeability affects stem and current-year shoot growth of linden (Tilia europaea) street trees in Gothenburg, Sweden. We found that a small fraction of permeable ground surface in the vertically projected tree crown area caused lower stem growth and strongly suppressed current-year shoot growth. This finding can guide future city planning, demonstrating that the vitality of street trees is compromised when the permeable surface area in the vicinity of the tree is small.
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| 9. |
- Leo, Christoph, et al.
(författare)
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Are There Any Significant Differences in Terms of Age and Sex in Pedestrian and Cyclist Accidents?
- 2021
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Ingår i: Frontiers in Bioengineering and Biotechnology. - : Frontiers Media SA. - 2296-4185. ; 9
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This study has analyzed sex-specific differences in pedestrian and cyclist accidents involving passenger cars. The most frequently injured body regions, types of injuries, which show sex-specific differences and the general accident parameters of females and males were compared. Accident data from three different European countries (Austria, Netherlands, Sweden) were analyzed. The current analysis shows that for both, females and males, pedestrian and cyclist injuries are sustained mainly to the body regions head, thorax, upper extremities and lower extremities. The results show that the odds for sustaining skeletal injuries to the lower extremities (incl. pelvis) in females are significantly higher. It was observed in all datasets, that the odds of females being involved in a rural accident or an accident at night are lower than for males. Elderly pedestrian and cyclist (≥60YO) tend to sustain more severe injuries (AIS2+ and AIS3+) than younger pedestrian and cyclists (
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| 10. |
- Jägerbrand, Annika, 1972-
(författare)
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Dead or alive? : Testing the use of C:N ratios and chlorophyll fluorescence in vertical shoot profiles to determine depth of vitality and point of senescence in populations of bryophytes
- 2015
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Ingår i: Lindbergia. - : THE NORDIC AND DUTCH BRYOLOGICAL SOCIETY. - 0105-0761 .- 2001-5909. ; 38, s. 4-13
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Bryophytes with indeterminate growth rarely exhibit clearly identifiable modules or age segments, but can be vertically divided into different physiologically active zones, since physiological activity normally declines vertically along the shoot profile depth. The aim of this study was to investigate whether it is possible to use C:N ratios (C/N)and/or parameters from chlorophyll fluorescence measurements (e.g. Fv/Fm, Fm or qN)to determine if bryophyte tissue is alive, senescent or dead, and at what distance along the shoot segment profile the moss tissue cease to live. Variation in C:N ratios and chlorophyll fluorescence between sites was also examined. This study shows that it is possible to separate alive, senescing and dead parts of the moss shoots in Pleurozium schreberi, and that chlorophyll fluorescence is a good method to use, whereas C/N varies between sites and species (for Hylcomium splendens and Racomitrium lanuginosum)and does not seem to reflect physiological activity to the same degree.
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