Kilimanjaro ecosystems under global change: Linking biodiversity, biotic interactions and biogeochemical ecosystem processes

The KiLi project is a German Science Foundation funded research unit (DFG research unit FOR1246) and was approved in February 2010. The research unit comprises two central projects and seven subprojects from various disciplines. The KiLi project studies biodiversity and ecosystem processes under various land uses and at different elevations on Mt. Kilimanjaro, Tanzania. The project´s objectives are to assess the influence of climate and anthropogenic disturbance on biogeochemical processes and genetic, species and interaction diversity. Further, we aim at quantifying biodiversity-ecosystem functioning relationships along elevational gradients. We also want to estimate resilience and adaptive potential of natural and modified ecosystems to global change and strive to examine negative feedbacks of disturbance on local climate and ecosystem processes. Finally, we try to quantify temporal shifts in species distributions due to climate and land use change. 

Main partner: University of Wuerzburg, Germany