BACKGROUND The Mongolian steppe is one of the most important grasslands in the world but suffers from aridization and damage from anthropogenic activities. Understanding structure and function of this community is important for the ecological conservation, but has seldom been investigated. METHODOLOGY/PRINCIPAL FINDINGS In this study, a total of 324 quadrats located on the three main types of...

QUESTIONS What are the main floristic patterns in the Pannonian and western Pontic steppe grasslands? What are the diagnostic species of the major subdivisions of the class Festuco-Brometea (temperate Euro-Siberian dry and semi-dry grasslands)? LOCATION Carpathian Basin (E Austria, SE Czech Republic, Slovakia, Hungary, Romania, Slovenia, N Croatia and N Serbia), Ukraine, S Poland and the Brya...

Accurate understanding of crop biogeography facilitates comprehension of agronomic potential, genetic diversity, and crop–pathogen evolution. Classic perspectives are exemplified by Vavilov (1987), a posthumous compilation, and Harlan (1971). Origin and geographic spread of a given crop provide clues as to environmental interactions, including relative adaption to pests, pathogens, and abiotic ...

Above-ground perennial phytomass of Andalusian alfa grass steppes (7755·6 ± 1482 kg of dry matter ha (95% C.I.)) is clearly higher than phytomass density measured today in most alfa grass communities of the Maghreb because of low or inexistant present-day human-induced alterations and relatively favourable annual precipitation (370 mm) existing in these Spanish steppes. Total carbon storage mea...

Recently the stepped spillways have been used as an appropriate solution for energy dissipation. In the present study, Siahbisheh dam spillway is simulated by using Computational Fluid Dynamic (CFD), in which the Mixture method and Reynolds Stresses Model (RSM) turbulence model is used. In the first modeling series the over all steppes slope is constant. The number of the steps is increased to ...

This study aimed at investigating the potential of vegetation indices and precipitation-related variables derived from remote sensing to assess rangeland production in arid environment Moroccan Oriental region identifying challenges linked that particular biome. Vegetation (VIs) Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) computed various aggregation periods were first integrated into a Random Fores...