Aquatic plants (including floating plants that are invisible to the naked eye, phytoplankton) are primary producers of wetland ecosystems and play a vital role in maintaining biodiversity and stabilizing ecological functions. Intensified human activities and global climate changes are causing disturbances to aquatic plant habitats, such as eutrophication, heat waves, water level fluctuation, extreme drought and precipitation, biological invasion, and emission of greenhouse gas. Malignant changes in aquatic habitats lead to a dramatic reduction in the distribution area of aquatic vegetation, expansion of harmful algal blooms, loss of vulnerable species, and degradation of ecological functions. Furthermore, these disruptive events may act synergistically to impact the performance of aquatic plants and may have a vicious cascade effect on the maintenance of aquatic plant populations and ecological functions in wetlands.The challenges faced by aquatic plants in terms of resistance and adaptation to disturbance under global changes are ambiguous. The physiological, phenotypic, and genotypic responses of aquatic plants, regulation of enzyme system activity and metabolite content, post-disturbance resilience, and adjustment of life history strategies to complex and changing habitats are still unclear. Therefore, more studies are urgently needed to assess not only the effects of the magnitude and duration of disturbance under global changes on the performance of aquatic plants, but also the adaptation strategies of plants after disturbance and the cascading effects on the subsequent stability of the freshwater ecosystem.In this Research Topic, we welcome all submission types published in Frontiers in Plant Science that provide insight into aquatic plant responses to global changes, including but not limited to the following subtopics.• Aquatic plant growth performance and population maintenance.• Physiological and morphological responses of aquatic plants to global changes.• Recovery abilities of aquatic plant populations following disturbances under global changes.• Competition and coexistence of macrophytes and phytoplankton.• Spatial and temporal pattern of greenhouse gas emissions during aquatic plant succession.• Experiments conducted in the field or in controlled environments are equally welcome.
Aquatic plants (including floating plants that are invisible to the naked eye, phytoplankton) are primary producers of wetland ecosystems and play a vital role in maintaining biodiversity and stabilizing ecological functions. Intensified human activities and global climate changes are causing disturbances to aquatic plant habitats, such as eutrophication, heat waves, water level fluctuation, extreme drought and precipitation, biological invasion, and emission of greenhouse gas. Malignant changes in aquatic habitats lead to a dramatic reduction in the distribution area of aquatic vegetation, expansion of harmful algal blooms, loss of vulnerable species, and degradation of ecological functions. Furthermore, these disruptive events may act synergistically to impact the performance of aquatic plants and may have a vicious cascade effect on the maintenance of aquatic plant populations and ecological functions in wetlands.The challenges faced by aquatic plants in terms of resistance and adaptation to disturbance under global changes are ambiguous. The physiological, phenotypic, and genotypic responses of aquatic plants, regulation of enzyme system activity and metabolite content, post-disturbance resilience, and adjustment of life history strategies to complex and changing habitats are still unclear. Therefore, more studies are urgently needed to assess not only the effects of the magnitude and duration of disturbance under global changes on the performance of aquatic plants, but also the adaptation strategies of plants after disturbance and the cascading effects on the subsequent stability of the freshwater ecosystem.In this Research Topic, we welcome all submission types published in Frontiers in Plant Science that provide insight into aquatic plant responses to global changes, including but not limited to the following subtopics.• Aquatic plant growth performance and population maintenance.• Physiological and morphological responses of aquatic plants to global changes.• Recovery abilities of aquatic plant populations following disturbances under global changes.• Competition and coexistence of macrophytes and phytoplankton.• Spatial and temporal pattern of greenhouse gas emissions during aquatic plant succession.• Experiments conducted in the field or in controlled environments are equally welcome.