Climate Change and Plants in East Asia

East Asia, with its large, fast-growing population and rapid industrialization, is an important area for global environmental problems, both in terms of the generation of greenhouse gases and the effects of any change in crop yields. The probable climate changes caused by increased concentrations of greenhouse gases and the modeling of plant production, vegetation distribution, phenological events, and lake ecosystems are discussed in this book. Besides providing an overview and synthesis of recent research, this volume shows the importance of analyzing local field data on microclimates, soil environments, the extent of snow cover, and the productivity of mountain vegetation. The possible effects of increasing concentrations of carbon dioxide and rising temperatures on rice yield are shown from controlled environment experiments. This book will be particularly valuable to researchers and students in the fields of ecology, crop science, forestry, and environmental sciences as well as being of interest to anyone concerned with global environmental problems.

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I. Modeling and Prediction.- Climatic change scenarios for Monsoon Asia based on 2xCO2-GCM experiments.- Probable effects of climatic changes on plant production of Monsoon Asia.- Model expectation of impacts of global climate change on biomes of the Tibetan Plateau.- Effects of elevated CO2 and global climate change on rice yield in Japan.- Prediction of Japanese potential vegetation distribution in response to climatic change.- Climatic change and its impacts on the vegetation distribution in China.- Effects of global warming on the phenological observation in Japan.- Variations in the plant phenology affected by global warming.- Use of a water temperature-ecological model to simulate global warming effects on a lake ecosystem.- II. Mountain Vegetation.- Climatic change and snowpatches, revealed by soil stratigraphy around the nivation hollows.- Effects of external factors on growth and structure of Pinus pumila scrub in Mt. Kinpu, central Japan.- Effects of environmental conditions on the site dynamics of a subalpine forest in the Akaishi Mountains, Japan.- Modeling of snowmelt and soil temperature evolution in subalpine snow patch.- Expansion of elevational distribution of beech (Fagus crenata Blume) along the climatic gradient from the Pacific Ocean to the Sea of Japan in Honshu, Japan.- The temperate elements of the flora of the Nansei-Shoto (the Ryukyu Islands) and the global climatic change.- Concluding Remarks.