Conservation of alpine meadows: current status analysis, challenge responses, and future perspectives

Alpine meadows, as unique alpine ecosystems, play irreplaceable ecological roles in carbon sequestration, water conservation, and biodiversity protection. However, the combined stress of climate change and human activities has exacerbated their degradation. Approximately 16.5% of alpine meadows on the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau have degenerated into "black soil beaches" with vegetation coverage below 30%, causing ecosystem service values to drop to 5%~10% of their original state. This paper systematically reviews the degradation processes of alpine meadows and their driving mechanisms, revealing the vegetation succession patterns and soil degradation characteristics at different degradation stages. In terms of restoration technologies, short-term fencing enclosure (<5 years) can restore vegetation biomass to 75%~85% of pre-degradation levels, but long-term enclosure (>10 years) may trigger secondary risks such as excessive proliferation of toxic weeds. Among artificial auxiliary techniques, reseeding with native grass species combined with biochar amendment and organic fertilizer application significantly enhances restoration efficiency, increasing soil total nitrogen content by 0.15~0.25 g·kg⁻¹ and microbial biomass carbon by 50%~70%. Nevertheless, existing technologies still face challenges in technical adaptability due to intensified freeze-thaw cycles and frequent extreme precipitation caused by climate warming and drying, as well as deep-seated conflicts between ecological protection and community livelihoods. Current research faces three major bottlenecks: significant heterogeneity in degradation threshold criteria, insufficient continuity of long-term ecological observation data (only 7.3% of stations have data exceeding 15 years), and limited accuracy of climate-grazing coupling models. Future studies should focus on analyzing multi-scale ecological processes, developing nature-based solutions (NbS) for climate adaptation, and constructing an integrated framework of “observation-simulation-management”. Priorities include breaking through micro-mechanisms such as plant-soil feedback mechanisms and the coupling processes of freeze-thaw cycles with carbon-nitrogen dynamics, while strengthening the integrated application of 3S technologies (remote sensing, geographic information system, global positioning system) and the Internet of Things. Monitoring efficiency should be improved through multi-platform remote sensing data fusion and deep learning algorithms. At the practical level, coordinated efforts are needed in ecological threshold management, altitude-gradient restoration (prioritizing 3800~4200 m elevation zones), and the construction of local germplasm resource banks to achieve synergistic optimization of ecological function restoration and socioeconomic development. This paper provides a theoretical basis and technical pathway for the systematic protection and adaptive management of alpine meadows.