Despite more than a century of study, our understanding of what controls the geographic distribution of species (and thus, what will determine range shifts under climate change) remains remarkably limited. We use a variety of observational and experimental techniques (e.g. dendrochronology and greenhouse studies) to disentangle biotic versus abiotic plant range constraints. We then dig into the mechanisms driving abiotic range constraints, where plant physiology is key to understanding and predicting range dynamics.
