This project investigates the response of plants to suboptimal conditions, by simulating some of the restrictions of plants in alpine ecosystems. Plants of Rhododendron cf. catawbiense were exposed to temperature and water stress for a period of 6 months and were compared to plants growing under normal conditions (control). Each treatment consisted of 15 plants, from which 5 leaves of each plant were marked and tracked along the experiment. TIR spectrum of each tracked leaf was measured at the beginning (0 months), in the middle (3 months) and at the end (6 months) of the experiment. Leaf traits were measured for 3 leaves of each plant (microscopy, morphology, and biochemistry).The treatments consisted in ambient temperature (20˚C), cold temperature (10 ˚C), well-watered soil – wet soil - (80% of the field capacity), and poor watered soil – dry soil - (20% of the field capacity).Code of the treatments:- Treatment 1 (T1): cold temperature / dry soil (CD)- Treatment 2 (T2): cold temperature / wet soil (CW)- Treatment 3 (T3): ambient temperature / wet soil (AW)- Treatment 4 (T4): ambient temperature / dry soil (AD)

1. Pictures in JPG format of the microscopic structures of the leaf/main vein for 3 leaves per plant.2. Infrared spectra from 1.4 to 16 micrometer and is presented in .csv file.Microscopic data:Instrument: Leitz Wetzlar optical microscope with an amplification from 4X to 630X.One folder per treatment:microscopy_rhododendron_6months_treatment1_plant#_leaf#microscopy_rhododendron_6months_treatment2_plant#_leaf#microscopy_rhododendron_6months_treatment3_plant#_leaf#microscopy_rhododendron_6months_treatment4_plant#_leaf#Code used in the pictures of microstructure:Example: r2t1p1l1_4x_001r2: rhododendron cf. catawbiense.t1p1l1:treatment 1, plant 1, leaf 1.4x: objective's magnification 4X (4 times). The total magnification of teh picture is 40X, 4X from the objective and 10X from the microscope.001: number of picturesSpectral data:Instrument: Bruker Vertex 70 FTIR spectrometer adapted with an external integrating sphere for hemispherical reflectance. Details on the spectrometer design and calibration procedures can be found in Hecker et al. (2011).The spectra were measured in the range 7000-600 cm-1 (1.4287-16.6666 µm) with a resolution of 4 cm-1. Per leaf, 520 scans per sample, and eight samples in total were taken. These measurements were averaged per leaf.To avoid errors produced by noise from the instrument during measurements, one measurement was included every day (dark current) with an open port (no sample on the sample port). This measurement was used to correct the reflectance of each leaf.Although the spectra were measured in the wavenumber domain, their wavelengths are displayed in micrometers as this is customary in the remote sensing community. Reflectance was converted to emissivity using Kirchhoff’s law (emissivity + reflectance = 1) and is presented in .CSV files.Code used in the spectral data:Example: t1p1l1_jun1413t1p1l1: treatment 1, plant 1, leaf 1.jun1413: date of measurement: June 14th /2013References:Hecker, C., Hook, S., van der Meijde, M., Bakker, W., van Werff, H., Wilbrink, H., van Ruitenbeek, F., de Smeth, B., & van der Meer, F. (2011). Thermal infrared spectrometer for earth science remote sensing applications-instrument modifications and measurement procedures. Sensors, 11, 10981-10999