COLLABORATIVE RESEARCH: Do lianas alter community and ecosystem dynamics in tropical forests? A large-scale experimental test

One of the most notable recent changes in tropical forests is the increase in woody vine (liana) abundance and biomass. This change is important because recent evidence suggests that lianas are major contributors to ecosystem processes and tree community coexistence. Increasing lianas will likely reduce tree growth, increase tree mortality, and change soil nutrient dynamics - thus changing tropical forest carbon, water, and nutrient fluxes. Lianas also may impede growth and regeneration of tree species with high wood density more than species with lower wood density, which would further reduce forest carbon stocks and fluxes. In the Republic of Panama, PIs will establish long-term experimental forest plots in which they remove lianas from half of the plots. The PIs will measure long-term changes in carbon dynamics, soil nutrient and water availability, and tree responses to lianas.

The proposed project will be the first large-scale, long-term experimental study to quantify the role of lianas in both community- and ecosystem-level processes, and it will provide a benchmark for predicting future tropical forest changes with changing liana abundance. The project will facilitate a variety of broader impacts, including international capacity building, student mentoring, and field-based education. The PIs will actively mentor post-docs and graduate and undergraduate students from the US and Latin America, as well as use the established experimental infrastructure for US-based study-abroad programs. The project also provides experimental infrastructure for additional collaborative research on tropical forest ecology.