Mechanisms and Consequences of Tree Responses to Water Stresses

Dear Colleagues,

Water deficit dramatically affects the production and yield of plants worldwide, and it is expected to affect forest health and forest community composition due to ongoing global climatic changes. Hydraulic failure and carbon starvation are the principal processes that occur in woody plants under conditions of water deficit and, depending on intensity and duration of water shortage, can lead to a wide range of effects starting from the decrease in growth up to tree mortality. Although the effect of water deficit on tree physiology has been widely studied in the past, some crucial questions remain without answers: (1) What kind of compensatory mechanisms occur in plants and organs to mitigate the effect of water stress? (2) What are the lasting legacies of single and/or recurrent water deficit events on tree growth and tree susceptibility to multiple abiotic/biotic stresses? (3) What kind of suitable proxies can be used to define early state of water stress of plants and the response capability of trees, plantations and forest stands? (4) How will the increased water deficit condition affect the forest biodiversity and the development of strategies giving tolerance or avoidance against stress? With this Special Issue of the journal Forests, we highlight the importance of deepening the knowledges on the mechanisms involved in the response of trees to water deficit and the consequences in term of tree health, water–carbon balance, and forest community composition.

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Forests is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• water deficit
• tolerance
• avoidance
• carbon metabolism
• hydraulic traits
• legacy
• compensatory mechanisms
• tree growth
• tree mortality
• forest community composition.