Past, present, and future geo-biosphere interactions on the Tibetan Plateau and implications for permafrost

Interactions between the atmosphere, biosphere, cryosphere, hydrosphere, and geosphere are most active in the critical zone, a region extending from the tops of trees to the top of unweathered bedrock. Changes in one or more of these spheres can result in a cascade of changes throughout the system i...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Ehlers, Todd A., Chen, Deliang, Appel, Erwin, Bolch, Tobias, Chen, Fahu, Diekmann, Bernhard, Dippold, Michaela A., Giese, Markus, Guggenberger, Georg, Lai, Hui-Wen, Li, Xin, Liu, Junguo, Liu, Yongqin, Ma, Yaoming, Miehe, Georg, Mosbrugger, Volker, Mulch, Andreas, Piao, Shilong, Schwalb, Antje, Thompson, Lonnie G., Su, Zhongbo, Sun, Hang, Yao, Tandong, Yang, Xiaoxin, Yang, Kun, Zhu, Liping
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:English
Published: Amsterdam [u.a.] : Elsevier 2022
Subjects:
Degradation
Ecology
Global change
Management
Permafrost
Tibetan Plateau
ddc:550
permafrost
Online Access:https://www.repo.uni-hannover.de/handle/123456789/14104
https://doi.org/10.15488/13990
Description
Summary:Interactions between the atmosphere, biosphere, cryosphere, hydrosphere, and geosphere are most active in the critical zone, a region extending from the tops of trees to the top of unweathered bedrock. Changes in one or more of these spheres can result in a cascade of changes throughout the system in ways that are often poorly understood. Here we investigate how past and present climate change have impacted permafrost, hydrology, and ecosystems on the Tibetan Plateau. We do this by compiling existing climate, hydrologic, cryosphere, biosphere, and geologic studies documenting change over decadal to glacial-interglacial timescales and longer. Our emphasis is on showing present-day trends in environmental change and how plateau ecosystems have largely flourished under warmer and wetter periods in the geologic past. We identify two future pathways that could lead to either a favorable greening or unfavorable degradation and desiccation of plateau ecosystems. Both paths are plausible given the available evidence. We contend that the key to which pathway future generations experience lies in what, if any, human intervention measures are implemented. We conclude with suggested management strategies that can be implemented to facilitate a future greening of the Tibetan Plateau.

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