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This project has received funding from the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No. 723649 Indoor environmental quality (IEQ) measurement and survey data of demonstration buildings in the hybridGEOTABS project

AbstractAutotrophs play an essential role in the cycling of carbon and nutrients, yet disease‐ecosystem relationships are often overlooked in these dynamics. Importantly, the availability of elemental nutrients like nitrogen and phosphorus impacts infectious disease in autotrophs, and disease can induce reciprocal effects on ecosystem nutrient dynamics. Relationships linking infectious disease with ecosystem nutrient dynamics are bidirectional, though the interdependence of these processes has received little attention. We introduce disease‐mediated nutrient dynamics (DND) as a framework to describe the multiple, concurrent pathways linking elemental cycles with infectious disease. We illustrate the impact of disease–ecosystem feedback loops on both disease and ecosystem nutrient dynamics using a simple mathematical model, combining approaches from classical ecological (logistic and Droop growth) and epidemiological (susceptible and infected compartments) theory. Our model incorporates the effects of nutrient availability on the growth rates of susceptible and infected autotroph hosts and tracks the return of nutrients to the environment following host death. While focused on autotroph hosts here, the DND framework is generalizable to higher trophic levels. Our results illustrate the surprisingly complex dynamics of host populations, infection patterns, and ecosystem nutrient cycling that can arise from even a relatively simple feedback between disease and nutrients. Feedback loops in disease‐mediated nutrient dynamics arise via effects of infection and nutrient supply on host stoichiometry and population size. Our model illustrates how host growth rate, defense, and tissue chemistry can impact the dynamics of disease–ecosystem relationships. We use the model to motivate a review of empirical examples from autotroph–pathogen systems in aquatic and terrestrial environments, demonstrating the key role of nutrient–disease and disease–nutrient relationships in real systems. By assessing existing evidence and uncovering data gaps and apparent mismatches between model predictions and the dynamics of empirical systems, we highlight priorities for future research intended to narrow the persistent disciplinary gap between disease and ecosystem ecology. Future empirical and theoretical work explicitly examining the dynamic linkages between disease and ecosystem ecology will inform fundamental understanding for each discipline and will better position the field of ecology to predict the dynamics of disease and elemental cycles in the context of global change.

In alpine grasslands, increased N deposition is increasing the dominance of grasses relative to other functional types according to our previous study Shen et al. (2022). However, the mechanisms that drive this compositional change are not fully understood. We measured the effects of 4-6 years' N addition to simulate N deposition at rates of 0 (CK), 8 (N1), 24 (N2), 40 (N3), 56 (N4), and 72 (N5) kg N ha-1 year-1 on dominant representatives of four functional types, Leymus secalinus (grass), Carex capillifolia (sedge), Potentilla multifidi (non-leguminous forb), and Medicago ruthenica (legume), in the alpine grassland on the Qinghai-Tibetan Plateau (QTP). In-situ experiment showed that N addition increased aboveground biomass in L. secalinus but had negative or neutral effects on aboveground biomass in the other species. Consistent with this finding, N addition increased net photosynthesis, chlorophyll content, and rubisco activity in L. secalinus with less positive effects on the other species. Nitrogen addition increased leaf N content in L. secalinus and C. capillifolia and reduced leaf non-structural carbohydrate content in all four species. In L. secalinus, the highest N addition rate (N5) reduced MDA content, a marker of oxidative stress, by enhancing antioxidant enzyme activity. Overall, our findings suggested that physiological factors can contribute to increased competitiveness of grass relative to sedge, forb and legume species under high N application levels. The rapid growth of this grass species reduces resource availability to non-grass species, increasing its dominance in the alpine meadow.