The Increase in Deforestation in the Amazon in 2013: a point off the curve or out of control?

Tropical ecosystems store over half of the world’s aboveground live carbon as biomass, and water availability plays a key role in its distribution. Although precipitation and temperature are shifting across the tropics, their effect on biomass and carbon storage...

In South America, the largest area of tropical savanna is the Brazilian Cerrado biome, which encompasses a considerable range of environmental variation, with different types of soil, geology, geomorphology and climate, as well as distinct types of vegetation....

Many tropical rain forest regions are at risk of increased future drought. The net effects of drought on forest ecosystem functioning will be substantial if important ecological thresholds are passed. However, understanding and predicting these effects is challenging using observational studies alone. Field-based rainfall exclusion (canopy throughfall exclusion; TFE) experiments can offer mechanistic insight into the response to extended or severe drought and can be used to help improve model-based simulations, which are currently inadequate.