Drought ForC

Drought ForC will focus on forest ecosystems, which are strongly affected by climate change and have a key role to play in mitigation efforts. Both scientists and foresters can benefit from better understanding how climatic conditions influence forest carbon sinks.

Drought ForC will explore the following topics:

• Carbon allocation among different tree organs and the link between photosynthetic assimilation and carbon sequestration in permanent organs
• The antagonistic effects of soil warming and drying on organic matter degradation and soil carbon sequestration
• How water stress influences access to mineral nutrients and the consequences for tree growth and function

To this end, the project will conduct research in forest ecosystems at French sites managed by ICOS and AnaEE , where carbon fluxes are being measured using the eddy covariance approach or rainfall manipulation experiments are being conducted. Drought ForC will also be building a large consortium of modellers. It will use pre-existing data for these study sites, employ new experimental set-ups, and deploy a wide range of modelling approaches to better understand the mechanisms behind forests’ responses to climate change, to quantify their impacts on carbon balance, and to refine climate projections.

Drought ForC is a large collaborative project that will utilise French sites in forest ecosystems (5 associated with ICOS and 4 associated with AnaEE), 12 process-based models operating at different spatial and temporal scales, and the contributions of 25 researchers from 10 laboratories.

The project’s objective is to streamline the integration of experimental knowledge into models and foster connections between experimental systems and national-scale models.

Coordinator: Jean-Marc Limousin, CNRS

Funding: €1,496,446 for 60 months