Xu Lab | Cornell University

Research

In the BioM2 lab, we are interested in the patterns and mechanisms of ecosystem dynamics under global environmental change. We study the ecophysiology of terrestrial plants and their role in the Earth system, using novel remote sensing tools and computational modeling.

Lab Publications

2023

Leaf economics fundamentals explained by optimality principles
Han Wang, I. Colin Prentice, Ian J. Wright, David I. Warton, Shengchao Qiao, Xiangtao Xu, Jian Zhou, Kihachiro Kikuzawa, Nils Chr. Stenseth
Science Advances  ·  18 Jan 2023

2022

Reduced ecosystem resilience quantifies fine‐scale heterogeneity in tropical forest mortality responses to drought
Donghai Wu, German Vargas G., Jennifer S. Powers, Nate G. McDowell, Justin M. Becknell, Daniel Pérez‐Aviles, David Medvigy, Yanlan Liu, Gabriel G. Katul, Julio César Calvo‐Alvarado, Ana Calvo‐Obando, Arturo Sanchez‐Azofeifa, Xiangtao Xu
Global Change Biology  ·  01 Mar 2022
Remote sensingEcosystem resilienceForest mortality

2021

Plant input does not exert stronger control on topsoil carbon persistence than climate in alpine grasslands
Donghai Wu, Xiangtao Xu, Haicheng Zhang
Ecology Letters  ·  12 Sep 2021
RadiocarbonTibetan PlateauSoil carbon turnover
Detecting forest response to droughts with global observations of vegetation water content
Alexandra G. Konings, Sassan S. Saatchi, Christian Frankenberg, Michael Keller, Victor Leshyk, William R. L. Anderegg, Vincent Humphrey, Ashley M. Matheny, Anna Trugman, Lawren Sack, Elizabeth Agee, Mallory L. Barnes, Oliver Binks, Kerry Cawse‐Nicholson, Bradley O. Christoffersen, Dara Entekhabi, Pierre Gentine, Nataniel M. Holtzman, Gabriel G. Katul, Yanlan Liu, Marcos Longo, Jordi Martinez‐Vilalta, Nate McDowell, Patrick Meir, Maurizio Mencuccini, Assaad Mrad, Kimberly A. Novick, Rafael S. Oliveira, Paul Siqueira, Susan C. Steele‐Dunne, David R. Thompson, Yujie Wang, Richard Wehr, Jeffrey D. Wood, Xiangtao Xu, Pieter A. Zuidema
Global Change Biology  ·  03 Sep 2021
Tree mortalityRemote sensing
Natural experiments and long-term monitoring are critical to understand and predict marine host–microbe ecology and evolution
Matthieu Leray, Laetitia G. E. Wilkins, Amy Apprill, Holly M. Bik, Friederike Clever, Sean R. Connolly, Marina E. De León, J. Emmett Duffy, Leïla Ezzat, Sarah Gignoux-Wolfsohn, Edward Allen Herre, Jonathan Z. Kaye, David I. Kline, Jordan G. Kueneman, Melissa K. McCormick, W. Owen McMillan, Aaron O’Dea, Tiago J. Pereira, Jillian M. Petersen, Daniel F. Petticord, Mark E. Torchin, Rebecca Vega Thurber, Elin Videvall, William T. Wcislo, Benedict Yuen, Jonathan A. Eisen
PLOS Biology  ·  19 Aug 2021
Marine ecology
Leaf surface water, not plant water stress, drives diurnal variation in tropical forest canopy water content
Xiangtao Xu, Alexandra G. Konings, Marcos Longo, Andrew Feldman, Liang Xu, Sassan Saatchi, Donghai Wu, Jin Wu, Paul Moorcroft
New Phytologist  ·  01 Jun 2021
Remote sensingTropical ecologyED2
Recovery: Fast and Slow—Vegetation Response During the 2012–2016 California Drought
Xi Yang, Xiangtao Xu, Atticus Stovall, Min Chen, Jung‐Eun Lee
Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences  ·  01 Apr 2021
Remote sensingTree mortality
Unraveling the relative role of light and water competition between lianas and trees in tropical forests: A vegetation model analysis
Félicien Meunier, Hans Verbeeck, Betsy Cowdery, Stefan A. Schnitzer, Chris M. Smith‐Martin, Jennifer S. Powers, Xiangtao Xu, Martijn Slot, Hannes P. T. De Deurwaerder, Matteo Detto, Damien Bonal, Marcos Longo, Louis S. Santiago, Michael Dietze
Journal of Ecology  ·  03 Mar 2021
ED2Tropical ecology
Monitoring tree-crown scale autumn leaf phenology in a temperate forest with an integration of PlanetScope and drone remote sensing observations
Shengbiao Wu, Jing Wang, Zhengbing Yan, Guangqin Song, Yang Chen, Qin Ma, Meifeng Deng, Yuntao Wu, Yingyi Zhao, Zhengfei Guo, Zuoqiang Yuan, Guanhua Dai, Xiangtao Xu, Xi Yang, Yanjun Su, Lingli Liu, Jin Wu
ISPRS Journal of Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing  ·  15 Jan 2021
PhenologyRemote sensing
Trait-Based Modeling of Terrestrial Ecosystems: Advances and Challenges Under Global Change
Xiangtao Xu, Anna T. Trugman
Current Climate Change Reports  ·  12 Jan 2021
Review

2020

Accelerated terrestrial ecosystem carbon turnover and its drivers
Donghai Wu, Shilong Piao, Dan Zhu, Xuhui Wang, Philippe Ciais, Ana Bastos, Xiangtao Xu, Wenfang Xu
Global Change Biology  ·  30 Aug 2020
Carbon turnover
Optimal leaf life strategies determine V c,max dynamic during ontogeny
Matteo Detto, Xiangtao Xu
New Phytologist  ·  22 Jun 2020
PhenologyOptimality principles
A catastrophic tropical drought kills hydraulically vulnerable tree species
Jennifer S. Powers, German Vargas G., Timothy J. Brodribb, Naomi B. Schwartz, Daniel Pérez‐Aviles, Chris M. Smith‐Martin, Justin M. Becknell, Filippo Aureli, Roger Blanco, Erick Calderón‐Morales, Julio C. Calvo‐Alvarado, Ana Julieta Calvo‐Obando, María Marta Chavarría, Dorian Carvajal‐Vanegas, César D. Jiménez‐Rodríguez, Evin Murillo Chacon, Colleen M. Schaffner, Leland K. Werden, Xiangtao Xu, David Medvigy
Global Change Biology  ·  23 Mar 2020
Tropical ecologyTree mortality
Allometric scaling laws linking biomass and rooting depth vary across ontogeny and functional groups in tropical dry forest lianas and trees
Chris M. Smith‐Martin, Xiangtao Xu, David Medvigy, Stefan A. Schnitzer, Jennifer S. Powers
New Phytologist  ·  24 Jan 2020
Tropical ecologyAllometryRootED2

2019

Tropical carbon sink accelerated by symbiotic dinitrogen fixation
Jennifer H. Levy-Varon, Sarah A. Batterman, David Medvigy, Xiangtao Xu, Jefferson S. Hall, Michiel Breugel, Lars O. Hedin
Nature Communications  ·  02 Dec 2019
Tropical ecologyNitrogen fixationED2