Project Leader: Prof. Dr. Andreas Fangmeier, Institute of Landscape and Plant Ecology, Department of Plant Ecology and Ecotoxicology

Funding period: 2015-2018

Carbon dioxide (CO₂) is emitted from various human activities. This causes atmospheric CO₂ enrichment and in turn climate warming as well as changes in precipitation patterns, thus affecting agro-ecosystems.

Besides effects on crop yield, CO₂ enrichment and the interactions with other environmental factors might also have deleterious effects on wheat grain quality. However, the underlying crop physiological processes are far from being clear.

The aim of this project is thus to provide experimental data to improve the mechanistic understanding of crop response in terms of yield formation and yield quality under climate change. Wheat will be used as model crop to make use of previous data and to fill some of the still existing gaps with regard to physiological responses of crops under climate change.

Two contrasting wheat genotypes will be exposed in a free-air CO₂ enrichment (FACE) system in the field in order to follow nutrient acquisition and allocation, and water relations and photosynthetic performance will be assessed by means of leaf gas exchange and actual plant transpiration measurements. Stable isotope analyses (¹³C, ¹⁵N) will aid to track C and N redistribution and to gain integrated estimates of water use efficiency and water relations. Besides targeted analyses, we will use metabolomic and proteomic approaches to identify subtle effects of climate change on grain yield quality.

We will also focus on comprehensive data evaluation (e.g., meta-analyses), including the impacts of selected constellations of climate factors covered by previous experiments, in particular extreme events such as high temperature and droughts and nitrogen forms, in order to elucidate the physiological processes.

Data will also be used to model impacts of climate change on crop growth and yield quality based on explicit simulation of plant internal transport processes. In addition, field assessments at the research sites and for “new crops” will be performed with regard to crop development and crop yield. Data will be provided to the whole consortium for model calibration and validation

Phase 1: Effects of climate change on yield and yield quality of selected crops – understanding the mechanistic background of CO2, heat and drought effects on wheat (funding period: 2012-2015)