Improving plant functional groups for dynamic models of biodiversity: at the crossroads between functional and community ecology.

Isabelle B; Pauline P; Sylvain A; Roland D; Luc G; Sébastien L; Sandra L; Jérémie VE; Pascal V; Wilfried T

doi:10.1111/j.1365-2486.2012.02783.x

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Journal article

Improving plant functional groups for dynamic models of biodiversity: at the crossroads between functional and community ecology.

Isabelle B Laboratoire d'Ecologie Alpine, UMR CNRS 5553, Université Joseph Fourier, BP 53, 38041 Grenoble Cedex 9, France.
Pauline P Laboratoire d'Ecologie Alpine, UMR CNRS 5553, Université Joseph Fourier, BP 53, 38041 Grenoble Cedex 9, France.
Sylvain A Conservatoire Botanique National Alpin, Domaine de Charance, 05000 Gap, France.
Roland D Laboratoire d'Ecologie Alpine, UMR CNRS 5553, Université Joseph Fourier, BP 53, 38041 Grenoble Cedex 9, France.
Luc G Conservatoire Botanique National Alpin, Domaine de Charance, 05000 Gap, France.
Sébastien L Laboratoire d'Ecologie Alpine, UMR CNRS 5553, Université Joseph Fourier, BP 53, 38041 Grenoble Cedex 9, France.
Sandra L Laboratoire d'Ecologie Alpine, UMR CNRS 5553, Université Joseph Fourier, BP 53, 38041 Grenoble Cedex 9, France.
Jérémie VE Conservatoire Botanique National Alpin, Domaine de Charance, 05000 Gap, France.
Pascal V Department of Ecology and Evolution, University of Lausanne, Bâtiment Biophore, CH-1015 Lausanne, Switzerland.
Wilfried T Laboratoire d'Ecologie Alpine, UMR CNRS 5553, Université Joseph Fourier, BP 53, 38041 Grenoble Cedex 9, France.

2014-01-10

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Global change biology. - 2012

English The pace of on-going climate change calls for reliable plant biodiversity scenarios. Traditional dynamic vegetation models use plant functional types that are summarized to such an extent that they become meaningless for biodiversity scenarios. Hybrid dynamic vegetation models of intermediate complexity (hybrid-DVMs) have recently been developed to address this issue. These models, at the crossroads between phenomenological and process-based models, are able to involve an intermediate number of well-chosen plant functional groups (PFGs). The challenge is to build meaningful PFGs that are representative of plant biodiversity, and consistent with the parameters and processes of hybrid-DVMs. Here, we propose and test a framework based on few selected traits to define a limited number of PFGs, which are both representative of the diversity (functional and taxonomic) of the flora in the Ecrins National Park, and adapted to hybrid-DVMs. This new classification scheme, together with recent advances in vegetation modeling, constitutes a step forward for mechanistic biodiversity modeling.

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