Raman spectroscopic investigation of 13CO2 labeling and leaf dark respiration of Fagus sylvatica L. (European beech)

An important issue, in times of climate change and more extreme weather events, is the investigation of forest ecosystem reactions to these events. Longer drought periods stress the vitality of trees and promote mass insect outbreaks, which strongly affect ecosystem processes and services. Cavity-enhanced Raman gas spectrometry was applied for online multi-gas analysis of the gas exchange rates of O-2 and CO2 and the labeling of Fagus sylvatica L. (European beech) seedlings with (CO2)-C-13. The rapid monitoring of all these gases simultaneously allowed for the separation of photosynthetic uptake of CO2 by the beech seedlings and a constant (CO2)-C-12 efflux via respiration and thus for a correction of the measured (CO2)-C-12 concentrations in course of the labeling experiment. The effects of aphid infestation with the woolly beech aphid (Phyllaphis fagi L.) as well as the effect of a drought period on the respirational gas exchange were investigated. A slightly decreased respirational activity of drought-stressed seedlings in comparison to normally watered seedlings was found already for a low drought intensity. Cavity-enhanced Raman gas monitoring of O-2, (CO2)-C-12, and (CO2)-C-13 was proven to be a powerful new tool for studying the effect of drought stress and aphid infestation on the respirational activity of European beech seedlings as an example of important forest species in Central Europe.