Predicting photosynthetic light-response curves

Photosynthetic light-response curves describe how leaf photosynthesis changes with light intensity, but they are time-consuming to measure, differ between species and change depending on the growth environment of the leaf. Lachapelle and Shipley study plants of 25 herbaceous species grown in four different light and fertility environments in an interspecific context and show that light-response curves can be predicted on the basis of two static leaf traits that are available in large trait databases, namely specific leaf mass and leaf nitrogen content.