The commonly observed high diversity of trees in tropical rain forests and corals on tropical reefs is a nonequilibrium state which, if not disturbed further, will progress toward a low-diversity equilibrium community. This may not happen if gradual changes in climate favor different species. If equilibrium is reached, a lesser degree of diversity may be sustained by niche diversification or by...

The expansion of industrial agriculture is a primary driver of tropical forest loss (Kartodihardjo and Supriono, 2000; Abdullah and Nakagoshi, 2008; Sodhi et al., 2010). Tropical forests harbor high levels of terrestrial biodiversity and are the principal habitat for apes in Africa and Asia (Junker et al., 2012). Numerous agro-industrial crops are found in ape ranges, including oil palm, peanut...

Selective logging, the targeted harvesting of timber trees in a single cutting cycle, is globally rising in extent and intensity. Short-term impacts of selective logging on tropical forests have been widely investigated, but long-term effects on temporal dynamics of forest structure and composition are largely unknown. Understanding these long-term dynamics will help determine whether tropical ...

The wet tropical forest is, on the whole, a unique ecosystem in the world that is known to house the absolute highest number of species of both plants and animals. In this regard, it is enough to stress that the total number of flowering plant species currently known around the world is ~250 000, of which ~90 000 are of the rain forests of South America and Central America, and ~30 000 are of t...

Although tropical forests cover only 6% of Earth's arable surface, they account for nearly 50% of all known species (National Research Council, 1992). Despite this diversity, these systems are increasingly threatened, as exemplified by a recent Food and Agriculture Organization report (FAa, 1999) which indicates that tropical countries are losing 127,300 km2 of forest annually; this does not co...

The expansion of industrial agriculture is a primary driver of tropical forest loss (Kartodihardjo and Supriono, 2000; Abdullah and Nakagoshi, 2008; Sodhi et al., 2010). Tropical forests harbor high levels of terrestrial biodiversity and are the principal habitat for apes in Africa and Asia (Junker et al., 2012). Numerous agro-industrial crops are found in ape ranges, including oil palm, peanut...

Host specialization in highly diverse tropical forests may be limited by the low local abundance of suitable hosts. To address whether or not fungi in a low-diversity tropical forest were released from this restriction, fruiting bodies of polypore basidiomycete fungi were collected from three species of mangroves (Avicennia germinans, Laguncularia racemosa, and Rhizophora mangle) in a Caribbean...

The time taken for forested tropical ecosystems to re-establish post-disturbance is of widespread interest. Yet to date there has been no comparative study across tropical biomes to determine rates of forest re-growth, and how they vary through space and time. Here we present results from a meta-analysis of palaeoecological records that use fossil pollen as a proxy for vegetation change over th...

A coupled numerical model of the global atmosphere and biosphere has been used to assess the effects of Amazon deforestation on the regional and global climate. When the tropical forests in the model were replaced by degraded grass (pasture), there was a significant increase in surface temperature and a decrease in evapotranspiration and precipitation over Amazonia. In the simulation, the lengt...