title: Negative feedback adjustment challenges reconstruction study from tree rings: A study case of response of Populus euphratica to river discontinuous flow and ecological water conveyance.
abstract: Drought stress changes the relationship between the growth of tree rings and variations in ambient temperature. However, it is not clear how the growth of trees changes in response to drought of varying intensities, especially in arid areas. Therefore, Tree rings were studied for 6years in Populus euphratica to assess the impacts of abrupt changes in environment on tree rings using the theories and methods in dendrohydrology, ecology and phytophysiology. The width of tree rings increased by 8.7% after ecological water conveyance downstream of Tarim River compared to that when the river water had been cut off. However, during intermediate drought, as the depth of the groundwater increases, the downward trend in the tree rings was reversed because of changes in the physiology of the tree. Therefore, the growth of tree rings shows a negative feedback to intermediate drought stress, an observation that challenges the homogenization theory of tree ring reconstruction based on the traditional methods. Owing to the time lag, the cumulative effect and the negative feedback between the growth of tree rings and drought stress, the reconstruction of past environment by studying the patterns of tree rings is often inaccurate. Our research sets out to verify the hypothesis that intermediate drought stress results in a negative feedback adjustment and thus to answers two scientific questions: (1) How does the negative feedback adjustment promote the growth of tree rings as a result of intermediate drought stress? (2) How does the negative feedback adjustment lower the accuracy with which the past is reconstructed based on tree rings? This research not only enriches the connotations of intermediate disturbance hypothesis and reconstruction theory of tree rings, but also provides a scientific basis for the conservation of desert riparian forests worldwide.
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Desert and Oasis Ecology, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Urumqi 830011, China.
authors.forename: Hongbo
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Ling
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Simulation and Regulation of Water Cycle in River Basin, Department of Water Resources, China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research, Beijing 100038, China.
authors.forename: Pei
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: College of Geomatics, Shandong University of Science and Technology, Qingdao 266590, China.
authors.forename: Bin
authors.initials: B
authors.lastname: Guo
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Desert and Oasis Ecology, Xinjiang Institute of Ecology and Geography, Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS), Urumqi 830011, China. Electronic address: linghongbo0929@163.com.
authors.forename: Hailiang
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.affiliation: School of Geography Science and Tourism, Xinjiang Normal University, Urumqi 830054, China.
authors.forename: Mao
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Ye
authors.affiliation: State Key Laboratory of Simulation and Regulation of Water Cycle in River Basin, Department of Water Resources, China Institute of Water Resources and Hydropower Research, Beijing 100038, China.
authors.forename: Xiaoya
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Deng
mesh_terms: D002681:China; D055864:Droughts; D004463:Ecology; D060587:Groundwater; D032107:Populus / Q000502:physiology*; D045483:Rivers; D013312:Stress, Physiological; D014867:Water
chemical_list: D014867:Water
keywords: Ecological water conveyance; Intermediate drought stress; Negative feedback adjustment; Tarim River; Tree rings