A new article by Dr Ofir Katz from the Dead Sea branch, recently published in the Ecological Society of America’s journal Ecosphere, unravels the significance of plant silicon uptake for plant community and ecosystem structure. Some plant species’ ability to take up and accumulate silicon provides them with an array of advantages, including adaptation to aridity and protection from animals. It therefore makes sense that this trait – and more importantly, its variability – affects how plant communities are assembled and accordingly how ecosystems function. The current study surveyed 15 sites in Israel, from the Upper Galilee to the outskirts of Eilat. It quantitatively characterized the local plant communities, sampling green biomass (annual growth) to estimate productivity and for silicon measurements. The results were examined against several models with different assumptions regarding the relationships between silicon concentrations and ecosystem structure and functioning.

The main conclusions were that including silicon concentrations in the models improved their quality: plant ecology can be understood better if one considers silicon. Moreover, results have shown that silicon concentrations and their variability among sites responds to environmental conditions, but also affects plant community structure and productivity. More importantly, this effect is not attributed simply to silicon’s occurrence or concentration, but mostly to its variation among plant species. In other words: silicon uptake is a trait that is integral to biodiversity, helping us understand how ecosystems are built, function and respond to environmental changes.

The study was done in collaboration with Prof. Marcelo Sternberg from Tel Aviv University, by Chanania Vorst (MSc student) and Dr Renan Fernandes Moura (postdoctoral researcher from Brazil), and funded by the Israel Science Foundation.

https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/ecs2.4907