Plant Ecology in a Changing World
  • Topics
    • Topic Overview
    • Biomes and Climates in a Changing World >
      • Adaptation, biodiversity, and environment
      • Climate constrains plant distributions
      • Biome and climate relationships
      • Deserts
      • Grassland, savanna, and shrub biomes
      • Forest biomes
      • Alpine and tundra biomes
    • Plant adaptation >
      • Plant microclimate 1
      • Plant microclimate 2
      • Leaf energy budgets
      • Water movement through the soil-plant continuum
      • Principles of photosynthesis
      • Photosynthesis responses to light and temperature
      • Environmental stresses limit resource capture and use
      • Nutrients in the environment
      • Adaptation to environmental stress
    • Resource Allocation Changes with Environment >
      • Architecture and canopy processes
      • Plant phenology and resource allocation enhance performance
      • Leaf economic spectrum
      • Life history and reproduction
      • Defense against herbivory
      • Plant competition
    • Plant Responses to a Changing World >
      • Global changes occurring today
      • Invasive species
      • Atmospheric CO2 impacts plant
      • C3/C4 photosynthesis and climate
      • Climate change and the global carbon cycle
      • Climate warming and its impacts
    • Engineering Plant Communities >
      • Remember Utah's past and envision our future
      • Restoration ecology
      • Managed ecosystems
      • Utah urban ecology
      • Urban ecological futures
  • Assignments
    • Assignment Overview
    • Discussion
    • Problem sets
    • Ecology & Global Changes
    • Plant ecology policy
    • Defense of policy
    • Exam #1
    • Exam #2
  • Campus
    • Campus Overview
    • Grasses
    • Green infrastructure >
      • GI Overview
      • Stormwater >
        • GI 1
        • GI 2
        • GI 3
        • GI 4
        • GI 10
      • Green roof
      • Pollinator >
        • Pollinator species
    • Trees of the Wasatch
    • Shrubs of the Wasatch
    • Invasives
  • Biomes
    • Biome Overview
    • Climate diagrams
    • Vegetation sight-seeing trip
    • Biome images
  • Models
  • Lab
Still in preparation - check back soon
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Topic 17 - 
Carbon balance - plant phenology and resource allocation enhance performance


Essential elements from Topic 17:
In this lecture, we discuss .  We will learn about
  • how plants allocate and reallocate resources to enhance performance 
  • how aboveground growth is a repeating sequence of vegetative, reproductive, and transport modules
  • carbon balance as an integrated approach to study growth, phenology, and reproductive patterns
  • constraints and tradeoffs in resource acquisition and utilization
  • constructions costs for tissues and the importance of understanding the distribution of carbohydrate, protein, and lipid composition
  • root-to-shoot ratio as an integrating concept
  • tradeoffs between growth and longevity
  • the importance of allocation to defensive compounds/structures

Given the autotrophic dependence and general immobility of plants, a number of adaptation allow them to persist through rather large changes in the quality of the physical environment. In this lecture, we will see just how acclimation responses allow leaves to photosynthesize across a wide range of environmental conditions.


Click here to download PDF of slides associated with Topic 17
Click here to view YOUTUBE videos on Topic 17
Jim Ehleringer, University of Utah