About the Authors

Jian-Ying Ma

Affiliations Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou, People’s Republic of China, Key Laboratory of Western China’s Environmental Systems (Ministry of Education), Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, People’s Republic of China

Wei Sun

sunwei@nenu.edu.cn

Affiliation Institute of Grassland Science, Key Laboratory of Vegetation Ecology (Ministry of Education), Northeast Normal University, Changchun, People’s Republic of China

Xiao-Ning Liu

Affiliation Cold and Arid Regions Environmental and Engineering Research Institute, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Lanzhou, People’s Republic of China

Fa-Hu Chen

Affiliation Key Laboratory of Western China’s Environmental Systems (Ministry of Education), Lanzhou University, Lanzhou, People’s Republic of China

Competing Interests

The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: JYM WS FHC. Performed the experiments: JYM XNL WS. Analyzed the data: JYM WS XNL. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: JYM WS. Wrote the paper: JYM WS XNL FHC.