Species that persist in small populations isolated by habitat destruction may experience reproductive failure. Self‐incompatible plants face dual threats of mate‐limitation and competition with co‐flowering plants for pollination services. Such competition may lower pollinator visitation, increase heterospecific pollen transfer, and reduce the likelihood that a visit results in successful pollination

1. Individual‐level demographic outcomes should be predictable upon the basis of traits. However, linking traits to tree performance has proven challenging likely due to a failure to consider physiological traits (i.e., hard‐traits) and the failure to integrate organ‐level and whole plant‐level trait information.

1. The effects of changing climate and disturbance on mountain forest carbon stocks vary with tree species distributions and over elevational gradients. Warming can increase carbon uptake by stimulating productivity at high elevations but also enhance carbon release by increasing respiration and the frequency, intensity, and size of wildfires.

1.The coordination of traits from individual organs to whole plants is under strong selection because of environmental constraints on resource acquisition and use. However, the tight coordination of traits may provide underlying mechanisms of how locally adapted plant populations can become maladapted because of climate change.

Ecological theory predicts that the soil seed bank stabilises the composition of annual plant communities in the face of environmental variability. However, long‐term data on the community dynamics in the seed bank and the standing vegetation are needed to test this prediction. We tested the hypothesis that the composition of the seed bank undergoes lower temporal variability than the standing vegetation

Plant diversity is an important driver of belowground ecosystem functions, such as root growth, soil organic matter (SOM) storage, and microbial metabolism, mainly by influencing the interactions between plant roots and soil. Dissolved organic matter (DOM), as the most mobile form of SOM, plays a crucial role for a multitude of soil processes that are central for ecosystem functioning. Thus, DOM is

Stress gradients influence many ecosystem processes and properties, including ecosystem recovery from and resistance to disturbance. While recent analytical approaches have advanced multivariate metrics of ecosystem resilience that allow quantification of conceptual resilience models and identification of thresholds of state change, these approaches are not often translated to landscape scales. Using

Ecosystem models commonly use stable‐state assumptions to predict responses of soil microbial functions to environmental change. However, past climatic conditions can shape microbial functional responses resulting in a “legacy effect”. For instance, exposure to drier conditions in the field may shape how soil microbial communities respond to subsequent drought and drying and rewetting (DRW) events

The Janzen‐Connell Hypothesis (JCH) predicts that density‐responsive and host‐specific natural enemies limit the population sizes of abundant species. Importantly, these interactions help to maintain local community diversity through time. While ample evidence exists for the demographic predictions of the JCH, it remains unclear which natural enemies drive these dynamics across different plant communities

Catastrophic regime shifts in various ecosystems are increasing with the intensification of anthropogenic pressures. Understanding and predicting critical transitions are thus a key challenge in ecology. Previous studies have mainly focused on single environmental drivers (e.g., eutrophication) and early warning signals (EWSs) prior to population collapse. However, how multiple environmental stressors

1. Global change is expected to increase savanna woody encroachment as well as fire spreading into forest. Forest‐savanna ecotones are the frontier of these processes and can thus either mitigate or enhance the effects of global change. However, the ecology of the forest‐savanna ecotone is poorly understood. In this study, we determined whether a distinct ecotonal tree community existed between forest

There is evidence that the distribution of ecotypes of plants and their symbiotic arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi and other associated soil biota may be structured by the availability of essential soil nutrients; and that locally adapted partnerships most successfully acquire limiting nutrients. This study tests the hypotheses that plant genotypes are adapted to the water availability of their local

Understanding how plant populations respond to multiple drivers is increasingly critical for biodiversity conservation under global change. Indigenous knowledge can provide guidance for sustainable management, but the outcome of its application in novel ecosystems is rarely known. Simulating the re‐introduction of Indigenous stewardship in contemporary contexts with population models allows for the

Despite their low contribution to forest carbon stocks, lianas (woody vines) play an important role in the carbon dynamics of tropical forests. As structural parasites, they hinder tree survival, growth, and fecundity, hence they negatively impact net ecosystem productivity and long‐term carbon sequestration. Competition (for water and light) drives various forest processes and depends on the local