A global database of plant production and carbon exchange from global change manipulative experiments

Abstract

Numerous ecosystem manipulative experiments have been conducted since 1970/80 s to elucidate responses of terrestrial carbon cycling to the changing atmospheric composition (CO2 enrichment and nitrogen deposition) and climate (warming and changing precipitation regimes), which is crucial for model projection and mitigation of future global change effects. Here, we extract data from 2,242 publications that report global change manipulative experiments and build a comprehensive global database with 5,213 pairs of samples for plant production (productivity, biomass, and litter mass) and ecosystem carbon exchange (gross and net ecosystem productivity as well as ecosystem and soil respiration). Information on climate characteristics and vegetation types of experimental sites as well as experimental facilities and manipulation magnitudes subjected to manipulative experiments are also included in this database. This global database can facilitate the estimation of response and sensitivity of key terrestrial carbon-cycling variables under future global change scenarios, and improve the robust projection of global change‒terrestrial carbon feedbacks imposed by Earth System Models.