Bruce Osborne

• BA (Biology), PhD
• Professor at University College Dublin

Whilst invasive plants can modify community and ecosystem attributes, there is little information on their impact across different trophic levels. Here, we examined the effects of Gunnera tinctoria Molina (Mirb.; Gunneraceae ; “Chilean-rhubarb”) on the soil detrital food chain, the major pathway for energy flow in terrestrial ecosystems and the rec...

Whilst it is often assumed that invasive plant species may benefit more from climate change than native species, there is little empirical data on how they, and the communities they invade, respond to extreme weather events (EWEs). Here, we show that the effects of a low temperature EWE can result in a dramatic reduction in both vegetative and repr...

The establishment of plant species in coastal dune systems has received increasing attention in recent years due to their potential threats to the unique biotic and abiotic characteristics of these fragile ecosystems. Plants exhibiting invasive behavior, whether alien or native, merit particular focus in coastal dunes systems given their ability to...

Forests can play a key role in the mitigation of climate change, although there have been limited regional scale assessments that account for variations in soil type and tree species. Most of the focus has been on their ability to sequester atmospheric CO2, while there is less information on the two other major greenhouse gases (GHGs), N2O and CH4....

Context or problem: Management interventions involving straw return and modified tillage practices are increasingly being used to improve soil health and enhance soil carbon. However, both tillage practice and straw return may compromise these objectives through their enhancement of soil respiration. The extent and magnitude of this, as well as pot...

Agriculture significantly contributes to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, mainly via enteric and manure methane (CH4) from livestock and fertilizer-induced nitrous oxide (N2O) from soils. Mitigation strategies include dietary changes, feed additives, and fertilisation with circularity approaches. Agroforestry further offsets GHGs through carbon sequ...

Organic inputs in grasslands are known to enhance soil carbon sequestration. However, it remains unclear whether long-term organic inputs lead to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, specifically methane (CH 4) from livestock and nitrous oxide (N 2 O) from soils, that outweigh the benefits of carbon sequestration. Addressing this issue is crucial, as it...

The agricultural sector is a cornerstone of Ireland's economy and a significant contributor to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Agroforestry is a promising soluAon to address this dual challenge of economic sustainability and environmental impact. Agroforestry integrates trees, crops, grasses, and livestock into a harmonious system that supports far...

Context: The replacement of inorganic fertilizers with manures is gaining increased attention as a strategy for developing sustainable agroecological farming systems. Substituting synthetic N fertilizers with manure has been proposed to affect field N₂O emissions and crop yields. However, the global effects of such substitution practices on the tra...

Highlights the contribution of John Raven to aquatic CAM and the ability of some plants to obtain carbon via the root system.

The variability and drivers of carbon and water fluxes and their relationship to ecosystem water use efficiency (WUE) in natural ecosystems of southern South America are still poorly understood. For 8 years (2015–2022), we measured carbon dioxide net ecosystem exchange (NEE) and evapotranspiration (ET) using eddy covariance towers in a temperate ra...

Background and aims Many meadows are experiencing severe degradation due to the effects of global climate change and other human-related activity, especially overgrazing. The impact of grazing may however vary in different sites, but the dynamics and mechanisms associated with grazing-related meadow degradation on soil microbial biomass structure a...

Article Global patterns of soil greenhouse gas fluxes in response to litter manipulation Graphical abstract Highlights d Litter changes significantly influence soil GHG fluxes d Litter effects on soil CO 2 and N 2 O fluxes depend on multiple factors d Litter inputs have a threshold effect on soil CO 2 emissions d Litter modify soil GHG fluxes simil...

Introduced plants can have long-lasting and irreversible effects on the communities and ecosystems they invade. A critical step towards understanding the legacy of plant introductions is the characterisation of changes in the invaded plant communities and how these changes are related to biogeochemical modifications. Here, we addressed this issue b...

The variability and drivers of carbon and water fluxes and their relationship to ecosystem water use efficiency (WUE) in natural ecosystems of southern South America are still poorly understood. For eight years (2015–2022), we measured water and carbon fluxes using eddy covariance towers in a temperate rainforest and a peatland in southern Chile. D...

Incorrect labelling of plants in the horticultural trade and misidentification is widespread. For the inspection services of the EU member states, correct identification of G. tinctoria has become important since the species was added to the List of Union concern in accordance with EU regulation 1143/2014 in August 2017. In the horticultural trade...

Grassland soils are climate-dependent ecosystems that have a significant greenhouse gas mitigating function through their ability to store large amounts of carbon (C). However, what is often not recognized is that they can also exhibit a high methane (CH4) uptake capacity that could be influenced by future increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide (C...

Agricultural land use changes are expected to modify the carbon (C), nitrogen (N) and phosphorus (P) stocks compared to the native ecosystems they replace and result in changes in greenhouse gas (GHG) fluxes. To quantify these effects, we measured C-N-P stocks in four land cover classes (cropland, grassland, native shrubland and invaded shrubland)...

Invasive plants often modify soil biotic communities through changes in soil physicochemical characteristics or the amount and/or quality of litter inputs. We assessed the impacts of Gunnera tinctoria invasions on soil and the earthworm community, on Achill Island, Co. Mayo, Ireland. We compared replicated (n = 5) areas invaded by G. tinctoria with...

Although litter can regulate the global climate by influencing soil N2O fluxes, there is no consensus on the major drivers or their relative importance and how these impact at the global scale. In this paper, we conducted a meta-analysis of 21 global studies to quantify the impact of litter removal and litter doubling on soil N2O fluxes from forest...

The interventions that are required for both the control and post-invasion restoration of native plant communities depends on several factors, including the efficacy of the measures that are used and how these interact with environmental factors. Here, we report on the results of an experiment on the effects of mechanical removal and herbicide appl...

The future global distribution of flowering plants will depend on how they respond to environmental changes throughout their life cycle. Although much attention has been given to the response of seedlings and mature plants to global warming, the fate of seeds and seed germination has received less attention. Reliance on persistent seeds in the soil...

Carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) coupling processes in terrestrial ecosystems have the potential to modify the sensitivity of the global C cycle to climate change. But the degree to which C–N interactions contribute to the sequestration of terrestrial ecosystem C (Cseq), both now and in the future, remains uncertain. Methods In this study we used a met...

Heatwaves exert disproportionately strong and sometimes irreversible impacts on forest ecosystems. These impacts remain poorly understood at the tree and species level and across large spatial scales. Here, we investigate the effects of the record-breaking 2018 European heatwave on tree growth and tree water status using a collection of high-tempor...

Soil respiration is controlled by land‐use changes associated with cropland vegetation restoration, and this can vary with topography, although the magnitude of this effect and the underlying mechanisms are still unclear. We synthesized 69 recently published papers from China to explore the influence of topography‐related changes in land use on soi...

Forests contribute strongly to global carbon (C) sequestration and the exchange of greenhouse gases (GHG) between the soil and the atmosphere. Whilst the microbial activity of forest soils is a major determinant of net GHG exchange, this may be modified by the presence of litter through a range of mechanisms. Litter may act as a physical barrier mo...

Winter oilseed rape is traditionally established via plough-based soil cultivation and conventional sowing methods. Whilst there is potential to adopt lower cost, and less intensive establishment systems, the impact of these on greenhouse gas emissions have not been evaluated. To address this, field experiments were conducted in 2014/2015 and 2015/...

The overall impact that plant invasions have on greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) by plant-mediated effects and how these interact with environmental and management factors is largely unknown. To address this, we report on the effects of leaf removal and waterlogging, either singularly or in combination, on the fluxes of CO2 and N2O associated with th...

Simple Summary The potentially important role of forests in climate change mitigation suggests a strong need for a more detailed understanding of these ecosystems. Besides climatic conditions, diverse forest vegetation creates varied conditions for the activity of soil microorganisms, and particular attention should be focused on a comprehensive st...

Background: Photosynthesis is a key process in plants that is compromised by the oxygenase activity of Rubisco, which leads to the production of toxic compound phosphoglycolate that is catabolized by photorespiratory pathway. Transformation of plants with photorespiratory bypasses have been shown to reduce photorespiration and enhance plant biomas...

The importance of labile soil carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) in soil biogeochemical processes is now well recognized. However, the quantification of labile soil C and N in soils and the assessment of their contribution to ecosystem C and N budgets is often constrained by limited information on spatial variability. To address this, we examined spatial...

Although forest soils play an important role in the carbon cycle, the influence of topography has received little attention. Since the topographical gradient may affect CO2 emissions and C sequestration, the aims of the study were: (1) to identify the basic physicochemical and microbial parameters of the top, mid-slope, and bottom of a forest gully...

Forest ecosystems play an important role in regulating global temperatures through their capability to take up and store CO2 from the atmosphere, but the magnitude and sustainability of this carbon (C) sink is critically dependent on the availability of nutrients, particularly nitrogen (N). However, the extent to which the absolute amount of N or m...

Plant invasions represent a major global change in land/vegetation cover with the potential to significantly modify greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. To get a better understanding of the impacts of terrestrial invasive plants on soil GHG emissions we report, firstly, on experiments conducted on invasive populations of the N-fixing herbaceous species...

Whilst a range of strategies have been proposed for enhancing crop productivity many recent studies have focussed primarily on enhancing leaf photosynthesis under current atmospheric CO2 concentrations. Given that the atmospheric CO2 concentration is likely to increase significantly in the foreseeable future an alternative/complementary strategy mi...

Globally, soils store two to three times as much carbon as currently resides in the atmosphere, and it is critical to understand how soil greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and uptake will respond to ongoing climate change. In particular, the soil‐to‐atmosphere CO2 flux, commonly though imprecisely termed soil respiration (RS), is one of the largest ca...

Litter inputs can influence soil respiration directly through labile C availability and, indirectly, through the activity of soil microorganisms and modifications in soil micro-climate; however, their relative contributions and the magnitude of any effect remain poorly understood. We synthesized 66 recently published papers on forest ecosystems usi...

We quantified seasonal nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions and the associated emission factors (EFs) from: (i) winter oilseed rape (WOSR) cultivated under conventional tillage (CT) and strip tillage (ST) at four fertilizer rates (0, 160, 240 and 320 kg N ha⁻¹) in 2014/2015, and (ii) grassland plots receiving no fertilizer (0 kg N ha⁻¹), or mineral nitrog...

Soil fluxes of nitrous oxide (N2O) play an important role in the global greenhouse gas budget. However, the response of soil N2O emissions to climate change in temperate forest plantations is not yet well understood. In this study, we assessed the responses of soil N2O fluxes to experimental warming with or without water addition, using a replicate...

Aims Gunnera tinctoria is an unusual N-fixing plant species that has become invasive worldwide, generally in environments with a low evaporative demand and/or high rainfall. Amongst the many mechanisms that may explain its success as an introduced species, a contrasting phenology could be important but this may depend on an ability to grow and util...

Climate change is expected to result in more frequent periods of both low rainfall and above normal temperatures for many coffee growing regions. To understand how coffee reacts to such change, we studied the physiological and gene expression responses of the clonal variety C. canephora FRT07 exposed to water deficits under two different temperatur...

Interactions between the carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) cycles can impact on the sensitivity of terrestrial C storage to elevated atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations (eCO2). However, the underlying mechanisms associated with CN interactions that influence terrestrial ecosystem C sequestration (Cseq) remains unclear. Here, we quantitatively...

Full text available upon request. The accurate assessment of agricultural greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs) for accounting and mitigation options is still a key concern. An extensive body of data is available, but limitations of the different measuring approaches have often been ignored. Despite some constraints, chamber-based approaches have dominat...

Ireland, being an island situated on Europe’s western seaboard, has a fewer number of native species than mainland European Union Member States (MS). Increased numbers of vectors and pathways have reduced the island’s biotic isolation, increasing the risk of new introductions and their associated impacts on native biodiversity. It is likely that th...

Analyses the use of different models for determiining National GHG emissions in Ireland

The expansion in the cultivation of bioenergy crops to saline lands is of importance for ensuring food security as long as high productivity is maintained. The potential of switchgrass to grow under saline conditions was examined in three genotypes from a early seedling growth to full maturity at 50, 100, 200 and 300 mM of sodium chloride (NaCl). T...

Transgenic Arabidopsis thaliana plants expressing cyanobacterial decarboxylation genes GLCD1 (GLYCOLATE DEHYDROGENASE I), HDH (HYDROXYACID DEHYDROGENASE), ODC (OXALATE DECARBOXYLASE) alone, and HDH::ODC simultaneously were successfully developed. Plants independently expressing GLCD1, HDH, ODC, and HDH::ODC were referred to as GD, HD, OX, and HX pl...

Rainfall events can stimulate carbon dioxide (CO 2 ) emissions (i.e. the Birch Effect). However, the contribution of wetting-induced CO 2 emissions to annual C emissions remains largely unquantified, as does the impact of different rainfall amounts/wetting intensities, particularly at the field scale. In this study, the short-term impact of simulat...

The adoption and use of improved methodologies including models that reflect more robust emissions accounting procedures and the identification of specific mitigation options for agricultural greenhouse gases are a global concern. In Ireland, country-specific N2O emission factors (EFs) are constrained primarily by short-term measurements and limite...

The successful management of plant invasions is a global concern, given the large ecological and economic impacts of many introduced plant species, which may be compounded by interactions with other environmental and socio-economic changes. With the aim of identifying the challenges and opportunities associated with the management of terrestrial pl...

MANAGING INVASIONS BY TERRESTRIAL ALIEN PLANTS IN IRELAND: CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES Margherita Gioria, Colette O’Flynn and Bruce A. Osborne ABSTRACT The successful management of plant invasions is a global concern, given the large ecological and economic impacts of many introduced plant species. This concern may be compounded by interaction...

There are many factors that influence ecosystem scale carbon, nitrogen and greenhouse gas dynamics, including the inherent heterogeneity of soils and vegetation, anthropogenic management interventions, and biotic and abiotic disturbance events. It is important therefore, to document the characteristics of the soils and vegetation and to accurately...

The Integrated Carbon Observation System is a Pan-European distributed research infrastructure that has as its main goal to monitor the greenhouse gas balance of Europe. The ecosystem component of Integrated Carbon Observation System consists of a multitude of stations where the net greenhouse gas exchange is monitored continuously by eddy covarian...

Research infrastructures play a key role in launching a new generation of integrated long-term, geographically distributed observation programmes designed to monitor climate change, better understand its impacts on global ecosystems, and evaluate possible mitigation and adaptation strategies. The pan-European Integrated Carbon Observation System co...

Future climate change is expected to alter the terrestrial carbon cycle through its impact on soil respiration. In this study, we determined the responses of soil respiration and its components to experimental warming with or without water addition. A replicated in situ heating (∼2 °C above ambient soil temperatures) and water addition (170 mm in t...

Reduced tillage and cover cropping are common measures to minimize leaching losses of nutrients from cropland soils. While the efficiency of these measures for reducing inorganic N leaching has been studied intensively, their effect on dissolved, organically-bound nitrogen (DON) remains unclear. In this study, leaching of nitrate, ammonium and DON...

Land-use conversions and elevated temperature can impact on carbon dioxide (CO2) and nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions, both of which are important greenhouse gasses (GHGs). Afforestation activity has increased significantly over the last century with a significant focus in recent years directed at offsetting GHG emissions, as forests have a large capa...

Supplementary Information for 'Differential responses of soil CO2 and N2O fluxes to experimental warming'

Reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) assessment uncertainties and improvement in the quantification of sinks and offsetting mechanisms are a global necessity for the development of appropriate mitigation measures aimed at keeping global temperature <2oC. In order to meet these objectives precise, verifiable estimations of soil organic carbon (SOC) and...

In Ireland and Northern Ireland, Invasive Alien Plants are incurring significant ecological and socioeconomic costs at a range of scales, and these costs are predicted to rise in the near future. The invasive study taxa, Japanese knotweed s.l. and Giant rhubarbs are particularly problematic, not least because of their extensive rhizome tissues cont...

The original version of this Article contained an error in the first sentence of the Acknowledgements section, which incorrectly referred to the Estonian Research Council grant identifier as "PUTJD618". The correct version replaces the grant identifier with "PUTJD619". This has been corrected in both the PDF and HTML versions of the Article.

Nitrous oxide (N2O) is a powerful greenhouse gas and the main driver of stratospheric ozone depletion. Since soils are the largest source of N2O, predicting soil response to changes in climate or land use is central to understanding and managing N2O. Here we find that N2O flux can be predicted by models incorporating soil nitrate concentration (NO3...

Reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) assessment uncertainties and improvement in the quantification of sinks and offsetting mechanisms are required to develop appropriate mitigation measures aimed at keeping global temperature <2oC. The key factors that are needed to fulfil these objectives are a precise, verifiable estimation of soil organic carbon (...

Invasive alien plants represent a major threat to Ireland's biodiversity and ecosystems, not only in productive or disturbed areas but also in habitats of high conservation value. With a focus on the major terrestrial invasive alien plants occurring in Ireland, we performed a systematic review of current knowledge on a wide range of environmental i...

This assesses the use of herbicide to control Japanese Knotweed and Giant Rhubarb.

IUCN data sheet providing information on Gunnera tinctoria control and management

The Paris Agreement emphasises the need for enhanced greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation measures, a reduction in assessment uncertainties, better quantified sinks, and the tailored use of different offsetting mechanisms to keep global temperature <2°C. A precise, verifiable estimation of soil organic carbon (SOC), and its variation at field scales has...

Given their increasing trend in Europe, an understanding of the role that flooding events play in carbon (C) and nitrogen (N) cycling and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions will be important for improved assessments of local and regional GHG budgets. This study presents the results of an analysis of the CO2 and N2O fluxes from a coastal grassland ecosy...

Climate change is expected to increase the frequency of above-normal atmospheric water deficits contemporaneous with periods of high temperatures. Here we explore alterations in physiology and gene expression in leaves of Coffea canephora Pierre ex A. Froehner caused by a sharp drop in relative humidity (RH) at three different temperatures. Both st...

Given their increasing trend in Europe, an understanding of the role that flooding events play in carbon and nitrogen cycling and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions will be important for improved assessments of local and regional GHG budgets. This study presents the results of an analysis of the CO2 and N2O fluxes from a coastal grassland ecosystem aff...

This covers the best approaches and cost associated with the control of G.tinctoria

Carbon (C) emissions from anthropogenic land use have accelerated climate change. To reduce C emissions, dynamic models can be used to assess the impact of human drivers on terrestrial C sequestration. Model accuracy requires correct initialisation, since incorrect initialisation can influence the results obtained. Therefore, we sought to improve t...

Aims Plant invasions represent a unique opportunity to study the mechanisms underlying community assembly rules and species distribution patterns. While a superior competitive ability has often been proposed as a major driver of successful plant invasions, its significance depends crucially on the timing of any competitive interaction. We assess wh...