Baldwin's research focuses on one of the most important ecosystem types: the wetlands.
Image Credit: Edwin Remsberg
A study conducted by Andrew Baldwin of the Department of Environmental Science and Technology and Kai Jensen of the University of Hamburg, Germany, has shed new light on how climate change affects the growth and diversity of tidal freshwater wetland plants in Europe and North America.
The study is in print in Global Change Biology and is already having an impact; being cited in both the American journal Evolutionary Applications and European Union news service Science for Environment Policy.
“This is nicely demonstrated by a recent study of wetland seed banks from multiple latitudes across two continents in which species diversity of communities from southern latitudes were found to be less affected by experimental warming than those from more northern latitudes.”
Science for Environment Policy
“Wetland biodiversity may fall under climate change, a new study suggests. The researchers’ experiments indicated that, overall, plant growth in wetlands will be boosted, but a small number of plants well suited to the warmer conditions will out compete other species. However, climate change’s effects on biodiversity may be less severe if plants are able to disperse to cooler locations, towards the poles.”
