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Forest health and global change

S. Trumbore [email protected], P. Brando, and H. Hartmann
Science • 21 Aug 2015 • Vol 349, Issue 6250 • pp. 814-818 • DOI: 10.1126/science.aac6759
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Abstract

Humans rely on healthy forests to supply energy, building materials, and food and to provide services such as storing carbon, hosting biodiversity, and regulating climate. Defining forest health integrates utilitarian and ecosystem measures of forest condition and function, implemented across a range of spatial scales. Although native forests are adapted to some level of disturbance, all forests now face novel stresses in the form of climate change, air pollution, and invasive pests. Detecting how intensification of these stresses will affect the trajectory of forests is a major scientific challenge that requires developing systems to assess the health of global forests. It is particularly critical to identify thresholds for rapid forest decline, because it can take many decades for forests to restore the services that they provide.
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Science
Volume 349 | Issue 6250
21 August 2015

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Copyright © 2015, American Association for the Advancement of Science.

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Published in print: 21 August 2015

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Acknowledgments

P.B. received funding from NSF (DEB- 1146206) and the Brazilian National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (Bolsa de Produtividade number 307084/2013-2). S.T. and H.H. thank C. Allen for sharing an early draft of his paper and the participants of the International Interdisciplinary Workshop on Tree Mortality, held in October 2014 in Jena, Germany.

Authors

Affiliations

S. Trumbore* [email protected]
Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, 07745 Jena, Germany.
University of California–Irvine, Irvine, CA 92697, USA.
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P. Brando
Instituto de Pesquisa Ambiental da Amazônia, Belém, Pará 66035-170, Brazil.
Woods Hole Research Center, Falmouth, MA 02450, USA.
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H. Hartmann
Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, 07745 Jena, Germany.
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Notes

*Corresponding author. E-mail: [email protected]

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