Moisture‐induced greening of the South Asia over the past three decades

South Asia experienced a weakening of summer monsoon circulation in the past several decades, resulting in rainfall decline in wet regions. In comparison with other tropical ecosystems, quantitative assessments of the extent and triggers of vegetation change are lacking in assessing climate‐change impacts over South Asia dominated by crops. Here, we use satellite‐based Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) to quantify spatial–temporal changes in vegetation greenness, and find a widespread annual greening trend that stands in contrast to the weakening of summer monsoon circulation particularly over the last decade. We further show that moisture supply is the primary factor limiting vegetation activity during dry season or in dry region, and cloud cover or temperature would become increasingly important in wet region. Enhanced moisture conditions over dry region, coinciding with the decline in monsoon, are mainly responsible for the widespread greening trend. This result thereby cautions the use of a unified monsoon index to predict South Asia's vegetation dynamics. Current climate–carbon models in general correctly reproduce the dominant control of moisture in the temporal characteristics of vegetation productivity. But the model ensemble cannot exactly reproduce the spatial pattern of satellite‐based vegetation change mainly because of biases in climate simulations. The moisture‐induced greening over South Asia, which is likely to persist into the wetter future, has significant implications for regional carbon cycling and maintaining food security.     

1982-2020年东北森林带植被绿度时空变化特征

植被绿度变化（绿化或褐化）的时空格局研究有助于了解生态系统结构和功能的变化,制定适应气候变化的生态系统管理政策。在全球气候变化加剧的背景下,过去40a间东北森林带植被绿度如何变化仍不清楚。基于气象再分析数据分析了1982-2020年来东北森林带的气候变化趋势,以叶面积指数（LAI）作为植被绿度的衡量指标分析了东北森林带中大兴安岭、小兴安岭和长白山脉植被绿度的时空变化格局和影响因素。研究发现：1982-2020年东北森林带气候趋势呈现"暖干化"特征。研究区植被绿度总体呈绿化趋势,但2000年后植被绿度变化呈降低趋势的区域增加了7.23倍,主要位于大兴安岭西北部。影响因素分析表明,1982-2000年温度和土壤水分是植被绿度增加的主要驱动因素;而2000年之后,区域内植被绿化的主要驱动因素为土壤水分的增加,降雨和相对湿度降低引起的水分胁迫导致大兴安岭西北部植被褐化加剧。研究结果为揭示东北森林带固碳能力变化、制定适应气候变化的林业管理对策提供了科学参考。     

Trend changes in global greening and browning: contribution of short‐term trends to longer‐term change

Field observations and time series of vegetation greenness data from satellites provide evidence of changes in terrestrial vegetation activity over the past decades for several regions in the world. Changes in vegetation greenness over time may consist of an alternating sequence of greening and/or browning periods. This study examined this effect using detection of trend changes in normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) satellite data between 1982 and 2008. Time series of 648 fortnightly images were analyzed using a trend breaks analysis (BFAST) procedure. Both abrupt and gradual changes were detected in large parts of the world, especially in (semi‐arid) shrubland and grassland biomes where abrupt greening was often followed by gradual browning. Many abrupt changes were found around large‐scale natural influences like the Mt Pinatubo eruption in 1991 and the strong 1997/98 El Niño event. The net global figure – considered over the full length of the time series – showed greening since the 1980s. This is in line with previous studies, but the change rates for individual short‐term segments were found to be up to five times higher. Temporal analysis indicated that the area with browning trends increased over time while the area with greening trends decreased. The Southern Hemisphere showed the strongest evidence of browning. Here, periods of gradual browning were generally longer than periods of gradual greening. Net greening was detected in all biomes, most conspicuously in croplands and least conspicuously in needleleaf forests. For 15% of the global land area, trends were found to change between greening and browning within the analysis period. This demonstrates the importance of accounting for trend changes when analyzing long‐term NDVI time series.     

The greening and browning of Alaska based on 1982–2003 satellite data

Aim To examine the trends of 1982–2003 satellite‐derived normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) values at several spatial scales within tundra and boreal forest areas of Alaska. Location Arctic and subarctic Alaska. Methods Annual maximum NDVI data from the twice monthly Global Inventory Modelling and Mapping Studies (GIMMS) NDVI 1982–2003 data set with 64‐km² pixels were extracted from a spatial hierarchy including three large regions: ecoregion polygons within regions, ecozone polygons within boreal ecoregions and 100‐km climate station buffers. The 1982–2003 trends of mean annual maximum NDVI values within each area, and within individual pixels, were computed using simple linear regression. The relationship between NDVI and temperature and precipitation was investigated within climate station buffers. Results At the largest spatial scale of polar, boreal and maritime regions, the strongest trend was a negative trend in NDVI within the boreal region. At a finer scale of ecoregion polygons, there was a strong positive NDVI trend in cold arctic tundra areas, and a strong negative trend in interior boreal forest areas. Within boreal ecozone polygons, the weakest negative trends were from areas with a maritime climate or colder mountainous ecozones, while the strongest negative trends were from warmer basin ecozones. The trends from climate station buffers were similar to ecoregion trends, with no significant trends from Bering tundra buffers, significant increasing trends among arctic tundra buffers and significant decreasing trends among interior boreal forest buffers. The interannual variability of NDVI among the arctic tundra buffers was related to the previous summer warmth index. The spatial pattern of increasing tundra NDVI at the pixel level was related to the west‐to‐east spatial pattern in changing climate across arctic Alaska. There was no significant relationship between interannual NDVI and precipitation or temperature among the boreal forest buffers. The decreasing NDVI trend in interior boreal forests may be due to several factors including increased insect/disease infestations, reduced photosynthesis and a change in root/leaf carbon allocation in response to warmer and drier growing season climate. Main conclusions There was a contrast in trends of 1982–2003 annual maximum NDVI, with cold arctic tundra significantly increasing in NDVI and relatively warm and dry interior boreal forest areas consistently decreasing in NDVI. The annual maximum NDVI from arctic tundra areas was strongly related to a summer warmth index, while there were no significant relationships in boreal areas between annual maximum NDVI and precipitation or temperature. Annual maximum NDVI was not related to spring NDVI in either arctic tundra or boreal buffers.     

近30年新疆植被生长异常值时空变化及驱动因子

作为陆地生态系统的主体,植被的时空变化深刻地影响着景观格局和生态功能,深入理解植被动态及其对气候变化的响应,对于提高对生态过程的认识、加强生态管理具有重要意义。在一致性检验的基础上,利用中分辨率成像光谱仪(moderateresolution imaging Spectroradiometer,MODIS)的归一化植被指数(normalized Difference Vegetation Index,NDVI)数据集将新疆地区全球检测与模型研究组(Global Inventory Modeling and Mapping Studies,GIMMS)开发的NDVI数据集的时间序列拓展到2012年,探讨了生长季和各季节植被绿度、气候异常值的动态变化,分析了植被对气候变化的响应。研究结果显示,区域尺度和像元尺度GIMMS与MODIS NDVI之间的一致性较强。1982—2012年,研究区域生长季和各季节植被绿度呈显著增加趋势,但生长季存在明显阶段性:1998年前后分别呈显著增加和显著减少,夏季与秋季与生长季类似,而春季则不存在变化趋势的逆转。NDVI呈正异常值的面积比例与区域尺度NDVI的变化趋势一致;极端异常值、较大异常值多呈明显减少趋势,而一般异常值多呈增加趋势,NDVI的变化倾向于逐渐平稳。区域变暖趋势显著,降水量略有增加,潜在蒸散发显著提高,而湿润指数变化不明显。气温、潜在蒸散发主要在春季、秋季促进植被生长,而夏季降水量、湿润指数对植被生长的调节作用更为突出。     

Satellite‐based evidence for shrub and graminoid tundra expansion in northern Quebec from 1986 to 2010

Global vegetation models predict rapid poleward migration of tundra and boreal forest vegetation in response to climate warming. Local plot and air‐photo studies have documented recent changes in high‐latitude vegetation composition and structure, consistent with warming trends. To bridge these two scales of inference, we analyzed a 24‐year (1986–2010) Landsat time series in a latitudinal transect across the boreal forest‐tundra biome boundary in northern Quebec province, Canada. This region has experienced rapid warming during both winter and summer months during the last 40 years. Using a per‐pixel (30 m) trend analysis, 30% of the observable (cloud‐free) land area experienced a significant (P < 0.05) positive trend in the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI). However, greening trends were not evenly split among cover types. Low shrub and graminoid tundra contributed preferentially to the greening trend, while forested areas were less likely to show significant trends in NDVI. These trends reflect increasing leaf area, rather than an increase in growing season length, because Landsat data were restricted to peak‐summer conditions. The average NDVI trend (0.007 yr^?1) corresponds to a leaf‐area index (LAI) increase of ~0.6 based on the regional relationship between LAI and NDVI from the Moderate Resolution Spectroradiometer. Across the entire transect, the area‐averaged LAI increase was ~0.2 during 1986–2010. A higher area‐averaged LAI change (~0.3) within the shrub‐tundra portion of the transect represents a 20–60% relative increase in LAI during the last two decades. Our Landsat‐based analysis subdivides the overall high‐latitude greening trend into changes in peak‐summer greenness by cover type. Different responses within and among shrub, graminoid, and tree‐dominated cover types in this study indicate important fine‐scale heterogeneity in vegetation growth. Although our findings are consistent with community shifts in low‐biomass vegetation types over multi‐decadal time scales, the response in tundra and forest ecosystems to recent warming was not uniform.     

Optimality principles explaining divergent responses of alpine vegetation to environmental change

Recent increases in vegetation greenness over much of the world reflect increasing CO₂ globally and warming in cold areas. However, the strength of the response to both CO₂ and warming in those areas appears to be declining for unclear reasons, contributing to large uncertainties in predicting how vegetation will respond to future global changes. Here, we investigated the changes of satellite-observed peak season absorbed photosynthetically active radiation (F_max) on the Tibetan Plateau between 1982 and 2016. Although climate trends are similar across the Plateau, we identified robust divergent responses (a greening of 0.31 ± 0.14% year⁻¹ in drier regions and a browning of 0.12 ± 0.08% year⁻¹ in wetter regions). Using an eco-evolutionary optimality (EEO) concept of plant acclimation/adaptation, we propose a parsimonious modelling framework that quantitatively explains these changes in terms of water and energy limitations. Our model captured the variations in F_max with a correlation coefficient (r) of .76 and a root mean squared error of .12 and predicted the divergent trends of greening (0.32 ± 0.19% year⁻¹) and browning (0.07 ± 0.06% year⁻¹). We also predicted the observed reduced sensitivities of F_max to precipitation and temperature. The model allows us to explain these changes: Enhanced growing season cumulative radiation has opposite effects on water use and energy uptake. Increased precipitation has an overwhelmingly positive effect in drier regions, whereas warming reduces F_max in wetter regions by increasing the cost of building and maintaining leaf area. Rising CO₂ stimulates vegetation growth by enhancing water-use efficiency, but its effect on photosynthesis saturates. The large decrease in the sensitivity of vegetation to climate reflects a shift from water to energy limitation. Our study demonstrates the potential of EEO approaches to reveal the mechanisms underlying recent trends in vegetation greenness and provides further insight into the response of alpine ecosystems to ongoing climate change.     

Normalized difference vegetation index prediction based on the delta downscaling method and back-propagation artificial neural network under climate change in the Sanjiangyuan region,China

Predicting the response of vegetation to climate change through mathematical methods is an important way to understand ecosystem condition changes in ecologically vulnerable regions. We took the Sanjiangyuan region, one of the most sensitive areas to climate change, as the study area to construct a simpler calculation and higher resolution (suitable for regional scale study) nonlinear method to predict the normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) under climate change by combining the delta downscaling method and backpropagation artificial neural network. We first used the delta downscaling method to downscale the coarse-resolution climate element data of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (Phase 6) (CMIP6) to 0.08333° (regional scale). By analysing the relationship between NDVI and climate elements, we found that NDVI has the highest correlation with annual total precipitation, annual mean temperature, variation range of precipitation and temperature, etc. Then, we used these impact factors to train the back propagation artificial neural network (BP-ANN) and predict the NDVI in 2030 and 2060 under the SSP1–2.6 scenario and SSP5–8.5 scenario. The simulated results show that the BP-ANN can be used to construct the nonlinear relationship between NDVI and the impact factors on different scales. In the future, NDVI will increase under both the SSP1–2.6 scenario and the SSP5–8.5 scenario. The western part of the study area has the highest altitude, the ecosystem is more vulnerable, and the changes will be the most intense. This study is expected to provide a reference for understanding the impact of climate change on vegetation in national parks in plateaus and to provide a simpler NDVI prediction method for the evaluation of environmental quality under the impact of climate change with NDVI as one of the parameters.     

Impacts of land cover changes on climate trends in Jiangxi province China

Land-use/land-cover (LULC) change is an important climatic force, and is also affected by climate change. In the present study, we aimed to assess the regional scale impact of LULC on climate change using Jiangxi Province, China, as a case study. To obtain reliable climate trends, we applied the standard normal homogeneity test (SNHT) to surface air temperature and precipitation data for the period 1951–1999. We also compared the temperature trends computed from Global Historical Climatology Network (GHCN) datasets and from our analysis. To examine the regional impacts of land surface types on surface air temperature and precipitation change integrating regional topography, we used the observation minus reanalysis (OMR) method. Precipitation series were found to be homogeneous. Comparison of GHCN and our analysis on adjusted temperatures indicated that the resulting climate trends varied slightly from dataset to dataset. OMR trends associated with surface vegetation types revealed a strong surface warming response to land barrenness and weak warming response to land greenness. A total of 81.1 % of the surface warming over vegetation index areas (0–0.2) was attributed to surface vegetation type change and regional topography. The contribution of surface vegetation type change decreases as land cover greenness increases. The OMR precipitation trend has a weak dependence on surface vegetation type change. We suggest that LULC integrating regional topography should be considered as a force in regional climate modeling.     

Spatial relationship between climatologies and changes in global vegetation activity

Vegetation forms a main component of the terrestrial biosphere and plays a crucial role in land‐cover and climate‐related studies. Activity of vegetation systems is commonly quantified using remotely sensed vegetation indices (VI). Extensive reports on temporal trends over the past decades in time series of such indices can be found in literature. However, little remains known about the processes underlying these changes at large spatial scales. In this study, we aimed at quantifying the spatial relationship between changes in potential climatic growth constraints (i.e. temperature, precipitation and incident solar radiation) and changes in vegetation activity (1982–2008). We demonstrate an additive spatial model with 0.5° resolution, consisting of a regression component representing climate‐associated effects and a spatially correlated field representing the combined influence of other factors, including land‐use change. Little over 50% of the spatial variance could be attributed to changes in climatologies; conspicuously, many greening trends and browning hotspots in Argentina and Australia. The nonassociated model component may contain large‐scale human interventions, feedback mechanisms or natural effects, which were not captured by the climatologies. Browning hotspots in this component were especially found in subequatorial Africa. On the scale of land‐cover types, strongest relationships between climatologies and vegetation activity were found in forests, including indications for browning under warming conditions (analogous to the divergence issue discussed in dendroclimatology).