| Full text | |
| Author(s): |
Cabal, Ciro
[1]
;
Martinez-Garcia, Ricardo
[1, 2]
;
Aguilar, Aurora de Castro
[3]
;
Valladares, Fernando
[3, 4]
;
Pacala, Stephen W.
[1]
Total Authors: 5
|
| Affiliation: | [1] Princeton Univ, Dept Ecol & Evolutionary Biol, Princeton, NJ 08544 - USA
[2] Inst Fis Tedr UNESP, ICTP South Amer Inst Fundamental Res, Rua Dr Bento Teobaldo Ferraz 271, BR-01140070 Sao Paulo, SP - Brazil
[3] CSIC, MNCN, Natl Museum Nat Sci, Dept Biogeog & Global Change, Madrid 28006 - Spain
[4] Rey Juan Carlos Univ, Dept Biol Geol Phys & Inorgan Chem, Mostoles 28933 - Spain
Total Affiliations: 4
|
| Document type: | Journal article |
| Source: | Science; v. 370, n. 6521, p. 1197+, DEC 4 2020. |
| Web of Science Citations: | 9 |
| Abstract | |
Plant roots determine carbon uptake, survivorship, and agricultural yield and represent a large proportion of the world's vegetation carbon pool. Study of belowground competition, unlike aboveground shoot competition, is hampered by our inability to observe roots. We developed a consumer-resource model based in game theory that predicts the root density spatial distribution of individual plants and tested the model predictions in a greenhouse experiment. Plants in the experiment reacted to neighbors as predicted by the model's evolutionary stable equilibrium, by both overinvesting in nearby roots and reducing their root foraging range. We thereby provide a theoretical foundation for belowground allocation of carbon by vegetation that reconciles seemingly contradictory experimental results such as root segregation and the tragedy of the commons in plant roots. (AU) | |
| FAPESP's process: | 19/05523-8 - Toward a mechanistic theory for biological patterns and their ecosystem management possibilities |
| Grantee: | Ricardo Martinez Garcia |
| Support Opportunities: | BIOTA-FAPESP Program - Young Investigators Grants |
| FAPESP's process: | 19/24433-0 - Toward a mechanistic theory for biological patterns and their ecosystem-management possibilities |
| Grantee: | Ricardo Martinez Garcia |
| Support Opportunities: | Scholarships in Brazil - BIOTA - Young Researchers |
| FAPESP's process: | 16/01343-7 - ICTP South American Institute for Fundamental Research: a regional center for theoretical physics |
| Grantee: | Nathan Jacob Berkovits |
| Support Opportunities: | Special Projects |