Josep peñuelas @en

A work by CSIC and CREAF scientists highlights that wild plants are more fertile and more resistant to pests than traditional crop varieties because their roots release substances that help them to capture more nutrients and fight pathogenic bacteria and fungi in the soil. If these natural properties were transferred to conventional cultivated varieties, agricultural yield could be improved and the ecological impacts of pesticides and industrial fertilizers reduced.

Published in the journal PNAS (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences), a study to which the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) and CREAF have contributed has revealed that the time for which forests retain carbon has fallen by between 0.2% and 0.3% every year in recent decades. Plant mortality is rising due to higher carbon dioxide (CO₂) levels and, in particular, warming and droughts.

Partially managing rivers to make them cleaner only by reducing the amount of phosphorus and phytoplankton, can entail undesirable changes throughout the ecosystem due to a nutrient imbalance. This is the main result of a study by researchers Carles Ibáñez at IRTA and Josep Peñuelas, CSIC researcher at CREAF, which was published by Science.

According to an article by CREAF researchers Benjamin Stocker and Josep Peñuelas published in Nature Geoscience, drought impact studies based on satellite data do not factor in the effects of soil moisture.

A study involving CREAF's Josep Peñuelas has identified the optimal temperatures of terrestrial plant ecosystems throughout the world and indicates the size of their margin for adaptation to warming. Outside that margin, ecosystem growth slows sharply.

Which plant species grow where, alongside which others - and why? In a new study, an international research team presents the world's first global vegetation database which contains over 1.1 million complete lists of plant species for all terrestrial ecosystems.

Until now, the Arctic tundra has been the domain of low-growing grasses and dwarf shrubs. But new, taller plant species have been slowly taking over this chilly neighborhood, report an international group with the participation of researchers from CSIC-CREAF.

Josep Penuelas visited China the first two weeks of May 2018 as grantee of the Distinguished Fellow of the Chinese Academy of Science.

Plants' annual growing season has lengthened, exposing them to frost more often at a time when they are particularly sensitive. That can be detrimental to their activity and lead to substantial crop yield losses.

Once rehydrated, holm oaks have a large capacity for recovery thanks to their high adaptation to the Mediterranean climate. The release of organic compounds into the soil represents a considerable loss of carbon for the holm oak and also modifies the microbial community, which may lead to additional effects on the tree.