Abrupt increases in Amazonian tree mortality due to drought–fire interactions
Open accessAbstract
Significance: Climate change alone is unlikely to drive severe tropical forest degradation in the next few decades, but an alternative process associated with severe weather and forest fires is already operating in southeastern Amazonia. Recent droughts caused greatly elevated fire-induced tree mortality in a fire experiment and widespread regional forest fires that burned 5–12% of southeastern Amazon forests. These results suggest that feedbacks between fires and extreme climatic conditions could increase the likelihood of an Amazon forest “dieback” in the near-term. To secure the integrity of seasonally dry Amazon forests, efforts to end deforestation must be accompanied by initiatives that reduce the accidental spread of land management fires into neighboring forest reserves and effectively suppress forest fires when they start.
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Land uses fundamentally change fuel composition and structure, which can either increase or decrease fire occurrence.
“Land uses fundamentally change fuel composition and structure, which can either increase or decrease fire occurrence (Brando et al., 2014;Chergui, Fahd, Santos, & Pausas, 2018;Pausas & Fernandez-Munoz, 2012).”
From Fire as a fundamental ecological process: Research advances and frontiers (2020) · cites this paper as Brando et al., 2014
The intensification of these drivers may cause widespread tree mortality because of extreme droughts and fires.
“The intensification of these drivers may cause widespread tree mortality for instance because of extreme droughts and fires76.”
From Critical transitions in the Amazon forest system (2024) · cites this paper as [76]
Cites
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What Limits Trees in C<sub>4</sub> Grasslands and Savannas?
Bond, W. J. (2008) · Annual Review of Ecology, Evolution, and Systematics · doi:10.1146/annurev.ecolsys.39.110707.173411 · Cited by 909 · see citing works
Nepstad, D. C., Stickler, C. M., Filho, B. S., & Merry, F. (2008) · Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences · doi:10.1098/rstb.2007.0036 · Cited by 725 · see citing works
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Forest health and global change
Trumbore, S., Brando, P., & Hartmann, H. (2015) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.aac6759 · Cited by 1,042 · see citing works
Self-citationFrank, D., Reichstein, M., Bahn, M., Thonicke, K., Frank, D., Mahecha, M. D., Smith, P., van der Velde, M., Vicca, S., Babst, F., et al. (2015) · Global Change Biology · doi:10.1111/gcb.12916 · Cited by 1,037 · see citing works
Tropical forests are a net carbon source based on aboveground measurements of gain and loss
Baccini, A., Walker, W., Carvalho, L., Farina, M., Sulla-Menashe, D., & Houghton, R. A. (2017) · Science · doi:10.1126/science.aam5962 · Cited by 904 · see citing works
Fire as a fundamental ecological process: Research advances and frontiers
McLauchlan, K. K., Higuera, P. E., Miesel, J., Rogers, B. M., Schweitzer, J., Shuman, J. K., Tepley, A. J., Varner, J. M., Veblen, T. T., Adalsteinsson, S. A., et al. (2020) · Journal of Ecology · doi:10.1111/1365-2745.13403 · Cited by 729 · see citing works
Self-citationCritical transitions in the Amazon forest system
Flores, B. M., Montoya, E., Sakschewski, B., Nascimento, N., Staal, A., Betts, R. A., Levis, C., Lapola, D. M., Esquível-Muelbert, A., Jakovac, C., et al. (2024) · Nature · doi:10.1038/s41586-023-06970-0 · Cited by 607 · see citing works
Global patterns in the sensitivity of burned area to fire-weather: implications for climate change
Bedia, J., Herrera, S., Gutiérrez, J. M., Benali, A., Brands, S., Mota, B., & Moreno, J. M. (2015) · Agricultural and Forest Meteorology · doi:10.1016/j.agrformet.2015.09.002 · Cited by 276 · see citing works
Estimating the global conservation status of more than 15,000 Amazonian tree species
ter Steege, H., Pitman, N. C. A., Killeen, T. J., Laurance, W. F., Peres, C. A., Guevara, J. E., Salomão, R. P., Castilho, C. V., Amaral, I. L., de Almeida Matos, F. D., et al. (2015) · Science Advances · doi:10.1126/sciadv.1500936 · Cited by 205 · see citing works
Williams, A. P., & Abatzoglou, J. T. (2016) · Current Climate Change Reports · doi:10.1007/s40641-016-0031-0 · Cited by 173 · see citing works
Ecosystem heterogeneity and diversity mitigate Amazon forest resilience to frequent extreme droughts
Longo, M., Knox, R. G., Levine, N. M., Alves, L. F., Bonal, D., Camargo, P. B., Fitzjarrald, D. R., Hayek, M. N., Restrepo‐Coupe, N., Saleska, S. R., et al. (2018) · New Phytologist · doi:10.1111/nph.15185 · Cited by 111 · see citing works
Health benefits of reduced deforestation in the Brazilian Amazon
Damm, Y., Börner, J., Gerber, N., & Soares-Filho, B. (2024) · Communications Earth & Environment · doi:10.1038/s43247-024-01840-7 · Cited by 10 · see citing works
Self-citation
- Authors
- Brando, P. M., Balch, J. K., Nepstad, D. C., Morton, D. C., Putz, F. E., Coe, M. T., Silvério, D., Macedo, M. N., Davidson, E. A., Nóbrega, C. C., Alencar, A., & Soares-Filho, B. S.
- Affiliations
- Woodwell Climate Research Center (US)
- Pennsylvania State University (US)
- Earth Innovation Institute, San Francisco, CA 94110;
- Goddard Space Flight Center (US)
- University of Florida (US)
- Universidade de Brasília (BR)
- Instituto de Pesquisa Ambiental da Amazônia (BR)
- Universidade Federal de Minas Gerais (BR)
- ORCID
- Venue
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
- Publisher
- National Academy of Sciences
- Published
- 2014-04-14
- Volume
- 111
- Issue
- 17
- Pages
- 6347-6352
- ISSN
- 0027-8424 (ISSN-L)
- 1091-6490
- PMC
- PMC4035969
- OpenAlex
- W2110660663
- Cited by
- 804
- References
- 3
- Citations by year
- 2026: 53 · 2025: 62 · 2024: 66 · 2023: 54 · 2022: 98 · 2021: 87 · 2020: 85 · 2019: 62 · 2018: 68 · 2017: 47 · 2016: 56 · 2015: 50 · 2014: 15 · 2013: 1
- FWCI
- 46.29
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Locations
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (publishedVersion)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (publishedVersion)
- PubMed Central (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- eScholarship (California Digital Library) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Fire effects on ecosystems
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Plant Water Relations and Carbon Dynamics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Nature and Landscape Conservation › Forest ecology and management
- Keywords
- tipping points, fire regimes, canopy cover loss, aboveground live biomass, grass invasion, forest fragmentation, extreme drought, southeastern Amazon
- MeSH terms
- Brazil, Climate, Fires, Humidity, Temperature, Time Factors, Trees, Water, Biomass, Vapor Pressure, Droughts
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