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Modelling Climate Suitability For Ephedra Viridis In Space And Time, Anne Thomas, Richard Gill
Modelling Climate Suitability For Ephedra Viridis In Space And Time, Anne Thomas, Richard Gill
Journal of Undergraduate Research
Climate change is expected to decrease soil moisture in the sensitive, water-limited ecosystems of America’s southwestern deserts, leading to shifts in plant distributions and altering ecosystem function. Studies have already documented the loss of desert grasses and the expansion of desert shrubs on the Colorado Plateau near Canyonlands National Park.i The objective of this work is to identify the climatic and biophysical factors influencing the distribution of an evergreen shrub, Ephedra viridis, and its expansion in plot-scale studies over the past 30 years.ii A gymnosperm and member of the plant division Gnetophyta, this shrub is unique because of its …