title: Climate signals derived from cell anatomy of Scots pine in NE Germany.
abstract: Tree-ring chronologies of Pinus sylvestris L. from latitudinal and altitudinal limits of the species distribution have been widely used for climate reconstructions, but there are many sites within the temperate climate zone, as is the case in northeastern Germany, at which there is little evidence of a clear climate signal in the chronologies. In this study, we developed long chronologies of several cell structure variables (e.g., average lumen area and cell wall thickness) from P. sylvestris growing in northeastern Germany and investigated the influence of climate on ring widths and cell structure variables. We found significant correlations between cell structure variables and temperature, and between tree-ring width and relative humidity and vapor pressure, respectively, enabling the development of robust reconstructions from temperate sites that have not yet been realized. Moreover, it has been shown that it may not be necessary to detrend chronologies of cell structure variables and thus low-frequency climate signals may be retrieved from longer cell structure chronologies. The relatively extensive resource of archaeological material of P. sylvestris covering approximately the last millennium may now be useful for climate reconstructions in northeastern Germany and other sites in the temperate climate zone.
authors.affiliation: Section 5.2: Climate Dynamics and Landscape Evolution, GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, Telegrafenberg, 14473 Potsdam, Germany. liang@gfz-potsdam.de
authors.forename: Wei
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Liang
authors.forename: Ingo
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Heinrich
authors.forename: Sonia
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Simard
authors.forename: Gerhard
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Helle
authors.forename: Isabel Dorado
authors.initials: ID
authors.lastname: Liñán
authors.forename: Thilo
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Heinken
mesh_terms: D002473:Cell Wall; D002910:Chronology as Topic; D002980:Climate; D005843:Geography; D005858:Germany; D018613:Microscopy, Confocal; D041605:Pinus sylvestris / Q000033:anatomy & histology* / Q000254:growth & development; D018547:Plant Stems / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000254:growth & development; D013696:Temperature; D014197:Trees; D014934:Wood / Q000033:anatomy & histology / Q000254:growth & development
keywords: Pinus sylvestris; cell structure; dendroclimatology; quantitative wood anatomy; tree rings