FOR 1246: Kilimanjaro Ecosystems under Global Change: Linking Biodiversity, Biotic Interactions and Biogeochemical Ecosystem Processes

全球变暖、将自然生境转变为人类改良生境以及土地利用集约化的综合影响正在威胁热带山区生态系统维持的生物多样性和生态系统进程。因此，重要的生态系统服务，如水、食物和生物量的提供、侵蚀控制、碳和养分储存、气候调节、分解、授粉、种子传播和自上而下控制食草动物，都可能受到干扰。生态系统服务，特别是由生物地球化学和生物生态系统过程驱动的服务，与遗传、物种和群落层面的生物多样性密切相关，但对这些层面之间的功能关系和反馈环以及将生物多样性与生态系统的复原力或适应性变化联系起来的实际机制知之甚少。我们的项目旨在沿海拔梯度平行评估山上自然和人为干扰生态系统中的生物多样性和生态系统过程。坦桑尼亚乞力马扎罗山。在前两个阶段，我们建立了广泛的研究基础设施和联合研究设计，代表了13种主要的自然、干扰或人为土地覆盖类型，每种类型都有五个重复的地块，从热带稀树草原到非洲高山植被，海拔范围近3700米。测量了生态气候学动态和多种生态系统特性，如土壤理化和生物特性和养分有效性、水、碳和氮周转和通量、微量气体排放以及植物和根的生物量。在相同的生态系统中，植物、鸟类、蝙蝠、土壤节肢动物、选定的昆虫分类群的多样性以及相关的生物相互作用，即分解、授粉、种子传播、草食和捕食，都已被量化。在第三和最后阶段，我们将把研究单位重组为六个综合项目，这些项目将汇集前七个分项目和前一个项目Z2的专门知识、数据和结果，以解决总体性、跨学科的问题和假设。我们将(1)将遥感信息与生物多样性和生物及生物地球化学过程和生态系统功能联系起来，(2)评估土地利用、气候、土壤性质和生物地球化学循环之间的功能关系，(3)分析土地利用和气候对植物群落和与植物有关的生态系统功能的影响，(4)揭示生物多样性、植物-动物相互作用网络和生态系统功能之间的机制联系，(5)讨论在气候和土地利用变化下生物多样性对生态系统功能和稳定的重要性，以及(6)综合关于物种、生物多样性、生态系统和生态系统服务的养护和可持续利用的现有信息。

The combined impacts of global warming, conversion of natural to human-modified habitats and land use intensification are threatening biodiversity and ecosystem processes maintained by tropical mountain ecosystems. Thus, important ecosystem services such as provision of water, food and biomass, erosion control, carbon and nutrient storage, climate regulation, decomposition, pollination, seed dispersal, and top-down control of herbivores can be disrupted. Ecosystem services, particularly driven by biogeochemical and biotic ecosystem processes, are intimately connected with biological diversity at genetic, species and community levels, but little is known about the functional relationships and feedback loops between these levels and the actual mechanisms linking biodiversity to the resilience or adaptive change of ecosystems. Our project has aimed at the parallel assessment of biodiversity and ecosystem processes along elevational gradients in both natural and human-disturbed ecosystems at Mt. Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. During the first two phases, we established an extensive research infrastructure and a joint study design representing the 13 major natural, disturbed or anthropogenic land cover types, each with five replicated plots, along an elevational range of nearly 3700 m from tropical savannas up to afroalpine vegetation. Eco-climatological dynamics and multiple ecosystem properties such as physico-chemical and biological soil properties and nutrient availability, water, carbon and nitrogen turnover and fluxes, trace gas emissions, as well as plant and root biomass have been measured. In the same ecosystems, diversity of plants, birds, bats, soil arthropods, selected insect taxa and related biotic interactions, i.e., decomposition, pollination, seed dispersal, herbivory, and predation have been quantified. During the third and final phase we will restructure the research unit into six synthesis projects that will bring together expertise, data and results from the previous seven subprojects and the former project Z2 to address overarching, interdisciplinary questions and hypotheses. We will (1) link remote sensing information with biodiversity and biotic and biogeochemical processes and ecosystem functions, (2) assess the functional relationships between land-use, climate, soil properties and biogeochemical cycles, (3) analyse the effects of land-use and climate on plant communities and plant-related ecosystem functions, (4) reveal the mechanistic links between biodiversity, mutualistic plant-animal interaction networks and ecosystem functions, (5) address the importance of biodiversity for ecosystem functioning and stability under climate and land-use change, and (6) synthesize the available information on the conservation and sustainable use of species, biodiversity, ecosystems and ecosystem services.