Effects of habitat MAP and MAT on leaf-level traits of
C4 grasses
We investigated the relationship of leaf-level traits, affecting
gm and Kleaf and hence photosynthetic
C-gain and transpirational water-loss respectively, with two main
habitat climate variables- mean annual temperature (MAT) and mean annual
precipitation (MAP). Anatomical traits associated with
gm and Kleaf that were measured in
current study are shown in Fig. S1. Mean values along with SE for the
leaf-level traits measured in the current study are given in Table S2
and Pathare et al ., 2020. Mean values along with SE for MAP and
MAT are shown in Fig. S6. None of the measured photosynthetic C-gain or
transpirational water-loss traits in current study related with MAT
(Table 1). However, MAP showed a significant relationship with many
important leaf-level traits associated with photosynthetic C-gain or
transpirational water-loss (Table 1, Fig. S2, S3 and S4). Specifically,
there was a significant negative relationship between MAP and
Smes (R 2 = -0.50, P< 0.01), Sc (R 2 =
-0.60, P < 0.001), SDada(R 2 = -0.20, P = 0.06), SR
(R 2 = -0.21, P = 0.05),
Narea (R 2 = -0.21, P =
0.05), leaf thickness (R 2 = -0.35, P =
0.037), average VED (R 2 = -0.45, P =
0.01), VEDada (R 2 = -0.45,P = 0.01) and BSCW (R 2 =
-0.39, P = 0.021). Whereas, there was a significant positive
relationship between BSias and MAP
(R 2 = 0.27, P = 0.026). We also
investigated the relationship of functional traits like
gm and gsw with MAP for the 18
C4 grasses. There was no significant relationship
between gsw and MAP (Table 1). However, there was a
strong negative relationship between gm and MAP
(R 2 = -0.43, P = 0.015).