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Global Climate Change Digest
A Guide to Information on Greenhouse Gases and Ozone Depletion
Published July 1988 through June 1999

FROM VOLUME 3, NUMBER 1, JANUARY 1990

PROFESSIONAL PUBLICATIONS...
IMPACTS

Item #d90jan14

"Conservation and Global Warming: A Problem in Biological Adaptation to Stress," P.A. Parsons (Dept. Zool., Univ. Adelaide, Adelaide, S.A. 5000, Australia), Ambio, XVIII(6), 322-325, 1989.

Adaptation by plants and insects to substantial changes in desiccation stress has been demonstrated in the laboratory and in the wild. Experimental work in Drosophila melanogaster indicates that the cost is a reduction in available metabolic energy in desiccation tolerant strains. Since resistance to many stresses depends on metabolic rate, combinations of stresses including high temperatures will be expected to be cumulative. It follows that the potential for adaptation to temperature change will be reduced at a time desiccation is increasing.

Item #d90jan15

"Environmental and Economic Implications of Rising Sea Level and Subsiding Deltas: The Nile and Bengal Examples," J.D. Milliman (Woods Hole Oceanog. Inst., Woods Hole MA 02543), J.M. Broadus, F. Gable, ibid., 340-345, 1989.

By the year 2100, local sea levels at the Nile and Bangladesh deltas could be as much as 3.3 and 4.5 meters higher, respectively, than at present; Egypt and Bangladesh could lose 26% and 34%, respectively, of their currently habitable land. Additional loss of shoreline by erosion, loss of mangrove forests, and decreased agriculture and fisheries will exacerbate environmental and economic impacts.

Item #d90jan16

"The Effects of Preindustrial and Predicted Future Atmospheric CO₂ Concentration on Lyonia mariana L.D. Don," D. Overdieck (Univ. Osnabrück, Postfach 4469, D-4500 Osnabrück, FRG), Functional Ecol., 3(5), 569-576, 1989.

CO₂ net assimilation and transpiration rates were measured on the entire above-ground parts of 7-8 month-old seedlings grown for 2-3 months at 270 and 350 micro L/L CO₂, at constant climatic conditions, in growth chambers. Among the results: the mean transpiration rate during the investigation of response to light and CO₂ was 16% lower at 350 than at 270 and 15.5% lower at 650 than at 350 micro L/L CO₂.

Item #d90jan17

"Analysis of Effects of Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide and Ozone on Cotton Yield Trends," V.R. Reddy (Dept. Agric. Eng., Clemson Univ., Clemson SC 29631), D.N. Baker, J.M. McKinion, J. Environ. Qual., 18(4), 427-432, 1989.

To analyze the effects of [CO₂] and [O3] on cotton yield trends, simulations were made using the cotton crop model GOSSYM. Data from cotton breeders' trial sites from South Carolina, Texas, Arizona and California were used. The simulated effects changed from site to site due to interactions with soil, plant and atmospheric variables and with nutrient levels in the soil. Given enough N, the increased [CO₂] would probably result in a 10% increase in lint yield, although due to N stress during the growing season the plants could not fully utilize the increased [CO₂]. It appears that O3 is one of the contributing factors to the yield decline.

Item #d90jan18

"Effects of Long-Term Elevated Atmospheric CO₂ Concentration on Lolium perenne and Trifolium repens Canopies in the Course of a Terminal Drought Stress Period," I. Nijs (Dept. Biol., Univ. Antwerp, Universiteitplein 1, B-2610 Wilrijk, Belgium), I. Impens, T. Behaeghe, Can. J. Bot., 67(9), 2720-2725, 1989.

A terminal drought stress regime was imposed on vegetatively fully-developed plants in semicontrolled growth chambers. Lolium perenne was more sensitive to drought stress in its initial response and divided the available amount of water more proportionally over the stress period than Trifolium repens. Water-use efficiency was roughly doubled and affected later by drought stress in high CO₂ for both species. Concludes that high CO₂ treatment favors the survival of these two species when they are also exposed to severe, rapidly developing drought stress.