Vegetation modulates the exchange fluxes of momentum, energy and mass at the land surface and thereby affects climate system functioning. This project investigates climatic effects of vegetation from the standpoint that vegetation adapts optimally to its environment in terms of its form and functioning, thereby maximizing its productivity. Optimized vegetation properties and climatic impacts are investigated through sensitivity simulations and optimizations of coupled dynamic global vegetation - climate system model of intermediate complexity.
Intellectual Merit: The PI will (1) Quantify large-scale optima of the coupled climate-vegetation system with respect to important climate-related vegetation properties, such as stomatal conductance, rooting zone depth, and aerodynamic canopy roughness, (2) Quantify the associated climatic impacts, and (3) Validate vegetation properties derived by optimization by comparing these to observations across different vegetation types. Completion of this work will offer new insights into:
1. Optimization approaches to improve vegetation parameterizations in climate system models 2. Comprehensive treatment of the role of vegetation in the global climate system and its feedbacks to global climatic change.
Broader Impacts. The research will provide a better understanding of the role of vegetation adaptations in studies of present global climatic change. It will have important implications for global climate predictions.
This project provides learning experiences and training for undergraduate and graduate-level students in the field of climate system modeling and climate-vegetation interactions.
