Peatlands and climate change: experimental and palaeoclimatic perspectives
Northern hemisphere peatlands are substantial carbon stores. However, recent climate change and human impacts (e.g., drainage and atmospheric nutrient deposition) may trigger the emission of their stored carbon to the atmosphere. Biodiversity losses are also an important consequence of those changes. Global change experiments are often conducted to improve our understanding of the potential responses of various ecosystems to global warming and drought. Most of the experiments carried out in peatlands are focused on carbon balance and nitrogen deposition. Nevertheless, it is still unclear how fast peatlands respond to temperature changes and water-table lowering in the continental climate setting. The meeting will deepen cooperation between French and Polish partners in combining of short-term and long-term approaches to climate change studies with the focus on the peatland biodiversity and carbon sink.