Sustainably managing the Amazon region is essential to mitigating global climate change and to preserving the biological and cultural diversity of the region. After promising reductions in degradation in the 2010s, a return to historically high levels of land conversion and deforestation during the past 5 years has severely undermined these goals. This land conversion — primarily the result of logging, mining and ranching — has generated social, economic and environmental burdens across scales1. Encouragingly, signs of recovery towards Amazon protection are appearing under Brazil’s current federal administration. But amid the drop in deforestation, a new threat is on the rise: uncontrolled fires.
The role of leaf traits in determining litter flammability of south-eastern Amazon tree species
Leaf traits can limit or promote flammability, but how these traits vary and influence forest flammability in humid tropical forests is unknown. Species within the south-eastern transitional forests of the Brazilian Amazon are experiencing fire, particularly...


