Attributes of Trees as Crop Plants

Domestication. Perspectives on the evolutionary history of tree crops. The basis of selection, management and evaluation of multipurpose trees - an overview. Forest tree breeding and fruit tree breeding: strategies, achievements and constraints. Strategies for optimizing the yield of tree crops in suboptimal environments. Tree growth at cool temperaturea and prospects for improvement by breeding. The ideotype concept applied to forest trees. Definition and exploitation of forest tree ideotypes in Finland. The capacity for vegetative propagation in trees. The vegetative structure. Biometrical, structural and physiological relationships among tree parts. Dry matter partitioning in tree crops. Forest productivity in relation to carbon partitioning and nutrient cycling: a mathematical model. Prospects for manipulating vascular-cambium productivity and xylem-cell differentiation. Branching, crown structure and the control of timber production. Trees as producers of exudates and extractives. Trees as producers of fuel. Trees as fodder crops. Roots, symbionts and soils. Roots as a component of tree productivity. Improving tree crops using micro-organisms in designed systems. Trees as soil improvers in the humid tropics?. Exploiting tree crop-symbiont specificity. Flowering and fruiting. Promotion of flowering in the crops: different mechanisms and techniques, with special reference to conifers. Variability in flower initiation in forest trees. Reproduction behaviour of fruit tree crops and its implications for the manipulation of fruit set. Some attributes of nut-bearing trees of temperate forest origin. Trees in stands. Future fruit orchard design: economics and biology. Transpiration and assimilation of tree and agricultural crops: the 'omega factor'. The competition process in forest stands. Forest canopy design: biological models and management implications. Future forest design: economic aspects. Wood properties, and future requirements for wood products.