Chung-Wing is a second year PhD candidate under Dr. Kelly Andersen at the Asian School of the Environment, Nanyang Technological University, Singapore. Her current research focuses on how land-use change may impact belowground measurements in the Central Catchment Nature Reserve, specifically looking at nutrient frameworks. She is passionate about climate justice and activism and hopes to learn more about community-based approaches in restoration science.
25 - Chung-Wing Ko is the winner of the 2023 New Phytologist next generation scientists poster award
Root traits and belowground characteristics reveal nutrient uptake strategies across old-growth and secondary forests in Singapore’s Central Catchment Nature Reserve
C.-W. KO, V. SRINIVASAN, C. YONG, H. J. POON, F. PRADANA, Q. Y. HO, K. Y. CHONG, S. C. CHUA, K. ANDERSEN
Asian School of the Environment, Nanyang Technological University, 59 Nanyang Dr, Singapore 639798
Tropical forests on highly-weathered soils are limited by soil nutrient availability. Tropical plants have developed various nutrient uptake strategies to overcome this limitation. Accelerating land-use in Southeast Asian forests affects these strategies by volatilising nutrients and shifting tree species composition and therefore mycorrhizal dominance from ectomycorrhizae (ECM) to arbuscular mycorrhizae (AM). We expect forest types to differ in nutrient limitations and mycorrhizal dominance, resulting in different microbial and root morphological traits. To test this, we surveyed Singapore’s Central Catchment Nature Reserve and quantified soil nutrients, root morphological traits, and microbial parameters between secondary and old-growth forests. Plant-available soil nutrients are similar across forest types, but root morphological traits differentiate AM-dominated secondary forests from ECM-dominated old-growth forests. Early secondary forest roots are 45.3% longer, 18.1% thinner, and have 27.7% more area than old-growth forests. Furthermore, early secondary forests have 46.0% more below-ground carbon and 75.9% more microbial nitrogen compared to old-growth forests. These results suggest that arrested succession in Singapore is not based on soil nutrients, but on the community composition shift of plants, mycorrhizae, and microbes, thus impacting nutrient uptake. The implications of this research suggest novel conceptual frameworks are necessary for tropical nutrient economies across Southeast Asian forest types.