Taking the pulse of Earth's tropical forests using networks of highly distributed plots
Taking the pulse of Earth's tropical forests using networks of highly distributed plots
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DOI：
10.1016/j.biocon.2020.108849
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发表时间：
2021-07-27
影响因子：
5.9
通讯作者：
Tran, Hieu Dang
中科院分区：
文献类型：
--
作者：
Blundo, Cecilia;Carilla, Julieta;Tran, Hieu Dang
热带森林是地球上最具多样性和生产力的生态系统。虽然更好地了解这些森林对我们的集体未来至关重要，但直到最近，测量和监测森林的努力在很大程度上是脱节的。建立网络对于发现超越国界和供资机构视野的问题的答案至关重要。在这里，我们展示了全球社区如何应对热带生态系统研究的挑战，不同的团队在数千个长期地块中逐树测量森林。我们回顾这项工作的主要科学发现，并展示这一过程是如何改变热带森林科学的。我们的核心方法包括将长期基层举措与标准化协议和数据管理联系起来，以产生强大的规模化结果。通过连接热带研究人员并提升他们的地位，我们的社会研究网络模型认识到数据来源在科学发现中的关键作用。1999年与RAINFOR（南美）一起构思，我们的永久性情节网络已适应非洲（AfriTRON）和东南亚（T-FORCES），并在全球范围内广泛效仿。现在，这些多项举措通过ForestPlots.net网络基础设施整合在一起，将来自54个国家的24个情节网络的同事联系起来。总的来说，这些正在改变人们对热带森林及其生物圈作用的认识。我们共同发现了森林碳和生物多样性如何、在哪里以及为什么对气候变化做出反应，以及它们如何对气候变化做出反馈。这种长期的泛热带合作揭示了一个巨大的长期碳汇及其趋势，并明确了哪些驱动因素最重要，哪些森林过程受到影响，它们在哪里发生变化，滞后是什么，以及随着气候持续变化，热带森林未来可能的反应。通过利用一项非常古老的技术，地块网络正在引发热带森林科学的一场非常现代的革命。在未来，人类可以通过培育基层社区而受益匪浅，这些社区现在集体能够对地球上最珍贵的森林产生独特的长期了解。
Tropical forests are the most diverse and productive ecosystems on Earth. While better understanding of these forests is critical for our collective future, until quite recently efforts to measure and monitor them have been largely disconnected. Networking is essential to discover the answers to questions that transcend borders and the horizons of funding agencies. Here we show how a global community is responding to the challenges of tropical ecosystem research with diverse teams measuring forests tree-by-tree in thousands of long-term plots. We review the major scientific discoveries of this work and show how this process is changing tropical forest science. Our core approach involves linking long-term grassroots initiatives with standardized protocols and data management to generate robust scaled-up results. By connecting tropical researchers and elevating their status, our Social Research Network model recognises the key role of the data originator in scientific discovery. Conceived in 1999 with RAINFOR (South America), our permanent plot networks have been adapted to Africa (AfriTRON) and Southeast Asia (T-FORCES) and widely emulated worldwide. Now these multiple initiatives are integrated via ForestPlots.net cyber-infrastructure, linking colleagues from 54 countries across 24 plot networks. Collectively these are transforming understanding of tropical forests and their biospheric role. Together we have discovered how, where and why forest carbon and biodiversity are responding to climate change, and how they feedback on it. This long-term pan-tropical collaboration has revealed a large long-term carbon sink and its trends, as well as making clear which drivers are most important, which forest processes are affected, where they are changing, what the lags are, and the likely future responses of tropical forests as the climate continues to change. By leveraging a remarkably old technology, plot networks are sparking a very modern revolution in tropical forest science. In the future, humanity can benefit greatly by nurturing the grassroots communities now collectively capable of generating unique, long-term understanding of Earth's most precious forests.