Seasonality of net carbon exchanges of Mediterranean ecosystems across an altitudinal gradient

In the present climate change context it is important to understand the carbon balance seasonality of Mediterranean areas, that will suffer important changes in precipitation according to the last climate change predictions. This work analyzed the seasonality of carbon exchanges of three Mediterranean ecosystems according to a variety of water and temperature regimes due to differences in altitude (alpine, subalpine and lowland). Results show that the timing and duration of the growing season depended on temperature at the alpine site, while the dependence on water availability increased as altitude decreased. Thus, maximum values of net carbon uptake occurred in late spring for the alpine and subalpine sites (up to 60 and 30 gC m