Tropical Rainforests
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Tropical Rainforests
Tropical rainforests are among the most biologically diverse and ecologically complex environments on Earth. Research across the Amazon, Congo Basin, Southeast Asia, New Guinea, Central America, and other tropical regions shows that these forests contain extraordinary concentrations of plants, animals, fungi, and microorganisms while performing major functions in the global climate, water, and carbon cycles. Long-term forest plots and ecological studies also demonstrate that tropical forests vary considerably in species composition, soils, rainfall, structure, and responses to environmental change.
The research summarized here shows that intact primary rainforest remains particularly important for biodiversity. Forest structural integrity, rather than forest cover alone, strongly influences the survival of many tropical species. Logging, fragmentation, agriculture, mining, roads, hunting, fire, and other disturbances can alter ecological communities even where substantial tree cover remains. At the same time, selectively logged and naturally regenerating forests can retain or recover considerable ecological value, making their protection important alongside preservation of remaining primary forests.
Biodiversity and Rainforest Ecology
Tropical rainforests support exceptionally high species richness, but their biodiversity is not distributed evenly. Studies of tropical tree communities reveal that relatively small numbers of common species can account for a large proportion of individual trees even within extremely diverse forests. Interactions among moisture, soils, nutrients, competition, plant-soil feedbacks, seed dispersal, predation, and disturbance help maintain the complex biological communities characteristic of tropical forests.
Forest structure is also important. Tropical rainforests contain ecological environments ranging from dark forest floors to high canopies and emergent trees. Each supports different organisms and ecological interactions. Large trees are especially important for habitat and carbon storage but can also be particularly vulnerable to drought, fragmentation, and edge effects.
Research increasingly emphasizes functional and genetic variation in addition to species counts. Differences among individuals of the same tree species can influence drought resistance, while the loss of animals can change seed dispersal, plant recruitment, forest composition, and eventually carbon storage. These findings demonstrate that rainforest biodiversity involves interconnected ecological processes rather than simply the number of species present.
Climate, Rainfall, and Drought
Tropical forests and climate influence one another. Forest vegetation moves enormous quantities of water between soil and atmosphere, helping regulate regional rainfall. Research shows that air passing over forests can produce substantially more precipitation, while large-scale deforestation can reduce rainfall and produce hotter and drier regional conditions.
Climate change is increasing heat and water stress in many tropical forests. Some tropical organisms already live close to their thermal limits, and studies of insects and trees indicate that additional warming can create significant physiological stress. Severe droughts associated with El Niño and other climate anomalies can increase tree mortality, alter forest productivity, reduce arthropod diversity, and disrupt carbon and water cycling.
Long-term drought experiments show that tropical forests can undergo substantial structural changes when rainfall declines. Large trees may die disproportionately, and hydraulic failure in tree water-transport systems is an important mechanism of drought mortality. Forests can adjust following disturbance, but such adaptation may involve replacement of large trees, changes in species composition, and reduced carbon storage rather than complete ecological recovery.
Carbon Storage and Forest Dynamics
Tropical forests are major components of the global carbon cycle. Trees absorb atmospheric carbon dioxide through photosynthesis and store carbon in wood, roots, soils, and other organic material. Historically, intact tropical forests have absorbed a significant portion of human-generated carbon emissions, slowing the accumulation of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere.
Evidence indicates, however, that this carbon sink is weakening in some regions. Long-term measurements in African, Amazonian, and Australian forests show that increasing tree mortality, drought, heat, and other environmental pressures can reduce net carbon accumulation. Some tropical forests may shift from carbon sinks toward carbon sources when mortality and decomposition exceed new growth.
Forest productivity also depends on nutrients. Experiments demonstrate important roles for phosphorus, nitrogen, litter decomposition, and soil microorganisms in sustaining tropical forest growth. These relationships vary considerably among forests, making predictions about future tropical carbon storage dependent on climate, soils, species composition, forest structure, and disturbance history.
Deforestation, Logging, and Fragmentation
Tropical forests continue to be transformed by agriculture, logging, mining, infrastructure, fire, and other forms of land-use change. Commercial agriculture and commodity production are important drivers in many regions, while mining, roads, illegal logging, land grabbing, and organized criminal activity contribute to forest loss in others.
The ecological effects extend beyond areas where forests are completely cleared. Fragmentation creates forest edges with altered temperature, humidity, wind, vegetation, and animal communities. Studies have documented increased mortality of large trees, reduced biomass, changes in vertebrate populations, and altered ecosystem processes near forest edges.
Selective logging also changes forest structure and species composition. Nevertheless, research from Borneo and other tropical regions demonstrates that logged forests can retain substantial biodiversity and carbon stocks. Protecting degraded forests can therefore complement efforts to preserve intact primary rainforest, particularly where the alternative is conversion to agriculture or plantations.
Forest Recovery and Restoration
Secondary tropical forests can recover substantial biodiversity, biomass, and ecosystem functioning after agriculture, logging, or other disturbances cease. Recovery, however, occurs at different rates. Soil properties and some ecosystem processes can recover comparatively quickly, while original species composition and mature-forest biomass may require many decades or longer.
Natural regeneration can be an effective and comparatively inexpensive restoration strategy where seed sources, wildlife, soils, and surrounding forests remain sufficiently intact. Landscape connectivity is particularly important because animals and wind transport seeds from surviving forests into regenerating areas.
Severely degraded landscapes may require active intervention. Assisted natural regeneration, tree planting, protection from repeated disturbance, and restoration of ecological connectivity can accelerate recovery. Research therefore supports a combination of primary-forest protection, natural regeneration, and targeted restoration rather than reliance on a single strategy.
Wildlife and Ecological Interactions
Rainforest animals perform important ecological functions. Birds, mammals, insects, fungi, and other organisms participate in pollination, seed dispersal, seed predation, decomposition, nutrient cycling, and plant recruitment. The disappearance of wildlife can therefore alter forest structure even when trees initially remain standing.
Defaunation caused by hunting and habitat disturbance can reduce populations of large seed-dispersing animals. This may gradually favor smaller-seeded tree species and reduce the abundance of large, carbon-rich trees. Research also shows that smaller vertebrates, insects, and fungi sometimes compensate for ecological functions lost when larger animals disappear, although such compensation is incomplete and varies among ecosystems.
Protecting rainforest biodiversity consequently requires conserving ecological interactions as well as forest area. A forest that retains tree cover but has lost much of its wildlife may function differently from an intact ecosystem.
Amazon Rainforest
The Amazon is the world's largest tropical rainforest system and plays a major role in biodiversity conservation, rainfall generation, freshwater cycling, and global carbon storage. Research documents increasing pressures from deforestation, drought, wildfire, agriculture, mining, roads, and other development.
Climate change and deforestation can interact, potentially weakening the forest's capacity to recycle moisture and store carbon. Studies also demonstrate substantial variation across the Amazon in drought vulnerability, tree composition, soils, and hydraulic characteristics, meaning that different portions of the basin may respond differently to environmental change.
Human influence on Amazonian landscapes is not exclusively modern. Archaeological and ecological evidence indicates that Indigenous peoples have cultivated plants and modified parts of Amazonia for thousands of years. Contemporary Indigenous territories likewise play an important role in maintaining forest landscapes and biological diversity.
Congo Basin and African Rainforests
Central Africa contains the world's second-largest major tropical rainforest region. Large-scale tree inventories reveal considerable geographic variation in forest composition and vulnerability across the Congo Basin.
The region also contains enormous tropical peatlands storing vast quantities of carbon accumulated over thousands of years. Research into past climate conditions shows that prolonged drying can cause peat decomposition, raising concern that future climate change could destabilize these carbon stores.
African tropical forests face pressures from agriculture, logging, mining, fire, infrastructure development, hunting, and political instability. Conservation research emphasizes the importance of protected areas, sustainable forest management, community participation, and improved monitoring.
Southeast Asian Rainforests
Southeast Asian tropical forests contain exceptionally high biodiversity and endemism, including the forests of Borneo, Sumatra, New Guinea, and numerous tropical islands. These ecosystems face significant pressures from logging, plantations, agricultural expansion, fire, fragmentation, and infrastructure.
Research in Borneo demonstrates both the consequences of forest conversion and the continuing ecological importance of logged forests. Selectively logged forests can retain substantial wildlife and plant diversity, whereas conversion to intensive agricultural systems such as oil-palm plantations generally produces much larger ecological changes.
Increasing heat and drought present additional risks. Studies suggest that some Southeast Asian forests may approach physiological temperature limits as global temperatures rise, while drought and El Niño conditions can increase wildfire and peat-fire risks.
Indigenous Peoples and Rainforest Communities
Indigenous peoples have shaped and managed tropical forest landscapes for thousands of years. Research increasingly recognizes that Indigenous territories and traditional management practices can contribute significantly to maintaining biodiversity, forest cover, and ecosystem functions.
Rainforests also support human livelihoods, cultural traditions, food systems, medicines, languages, and systems of ecological knowledge. The loss of tropical forests can therefore threaten cultural diversity alongside biological diversity.
Effective conservation frequently depends on land rights, governance, enforcement, economic incentives, and participation by local communities. Protecting forests without addressing the people who live in and depend upon them can overlook an essential component of long-term rainforest conservation.
Conservation, Monitoring, and the Future of Tropical Forests
Protecting remaining intact tropical forests is one of the strongest themes across the research. Primary forests contain ecological structures and biological communities that cannot be rapidly recreated through plantations or young secondary forests.
At the same time, conservation strategies increasingly recognize the importance of degraded and secondary forests. Preventing further conversion, allowing natural regeneration, restoring ecological corridors, improving management of logged forests, and rehabilitating heavily degraded landscapes can substantially expand the area available for biodiversity and carbon storage.
New technologies are improving forest monitoring. Satellites, LiDAR, airborne sensors, camera traps, acoustic monitoring, and artificial intelligence can reveal changes in forest structure, wildlife, degradation, fire, and recovery that conventional forest-cover measurements may miss.
Long-term success ultimately depends on combining scientific monitoring with effective governance, protected areas, sustainable land use, Indigenous and community stewardship, restoration, enforcement, and financial mechanisms that make standing forests economically and politically viable.
Conclusion
Tropical rainforests are dynamic ecosystems that connect biodiversity, climate, water, carbon, soils, wildlife, and human societies. The research shows that their importance cannot be measured simply by the number of hectares covered by trees. Forest integrity, structure, species composition, wildlife populations, ecological interactions, and landscape connectivity all determine how well tropical forests function.
Climate change, drought, deforestation, fragmentation, logging, mining, fire, hunting, and agricultural conversion increasingly interact rather than operating as isolated threats. These pressures can reduce biodiversity, weaken carbon sinks, disrupt rainfall, alter species composition, and diminish the resilience of tropical ecosystems.
Yet the evidence also demonstrates substantial opportunities for conservation. Protecting intact primary forests remains essential, while safeguarding logged forests, encouraging natural regeneration, restoring degraded landscapes, maintaining wildlife populations, and supporting Indigenous and local stewardship can preserve and rebuild ecological functions. The future of tropical rainforests will therefore depend both on preventing further destruction and on allowing damaged forests the time, space, connectivity, and protection necessary to recover.
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Tropical Rainforests
Rainforest Ecology and Biodiversity
| Chris M. Smith-Martin et al. | Nature | 12 August 2026
Species intraspecific variation drives tropical forest drought resistance shows that variation within tree species can substantially influence their ability to survive increasingly dry tropical climates.
| Matheus Henrique Nunes et al. | Nature | 12 August 2026
Heterogeneous climatic controls on tropical-forest biomass examines how climate, soils, and topography interact to determine carbon storage across major tropical forest regions.
| Rodrigo Cámara-Leret et al. | Nature | 8 July 2026
The forest of knowledge under global change explores how climate change threatens Amazonian plants, ecosystem services, and the Indigenous cultures whose knowledge is linked to them.
| Timo Metz et al. | Nature | 8 April 2026
Biodiversity resilience in a tropical rainforest examines recovery across 16 taxonomic groups and finds that secondary tropical forests can regain much of their abundance and diversity within several decades.
| Kim L. Holzmann et al. | Nature | 4 March 2026
Limited thermal tolerance in tropical insects and its genomic signature finds that many lowland tropical insects have little capacity to withstand increasing temperatures.
| ForestGEO | Smithsonian Institution | 2026
Tropical Rainforest describes the Smithsonian ForestGEO network of permanent research plots spanning Amazonia, Africa, Southeast Asia, Oceania, and other tropical forest regions.
| Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute | Smithsonian Institution | 2026
Forest Floor explains the dark, humid lowest layer of tropical rainforest and the fungi, decomposers, insects, mammals, and other organisms that occupy it.
| ForestGEO | Smithsonian Institution | 2026
ForestGEO Asia documents long-term tropical forest plots used to study tree diversity, mortality, recruitment, climate responses, and ecological change across Asia.
| ForestGEO | Smithsonian Institution | 2026
ForestGEO Africa describes permanent forest research sites including Korup in Cameroon, Ituri in the Democratic Republic of Congo, and Rabi in Gabon.
| ForestGEO | Smithsonian Institution | 2026
ForestGEO Americas provides information on tropical forest monitoring sites from Amazonia through Central America and the Caribbean.
| David Kenfack | Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute | 2026
ForestGEO research in Africa investigates rainforest tree taxonomy, evolution, spatial distributions, forest dynamics, and responses to environmental change.
| Adam C. Sharp et al. | Nature | 6 August 2025
Stronger El Niños reduce tropical forest arthropod diversity and function documents links between intense El Niño events and declines in rainforest arthropod communities.
| Declan L. M. Cooper et al. | Nature | 10 January 2024
Consistent patterns of common species across tropical tree communities finds surprisingly similar patterns of tree dominance in African, Amazonian, and Southeast Asian forests.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences | 2024
Global rarity of high-integrity tropical rainforests for threatened and declining terrestrial vertebrates finds that less than a quarter of remaining rainforest habitat retains high ecological integrity.
| Edwin Lebrija-Trejos et al. | Nature | 15 February 2023
Effects of moisture and density-dependent interactions on tropical tree diversity shows how soil moisture influences ecological processes that maintain tree diversity.
| Andrew P. Bladon et al. | Nature Ecology & Evolution | 2022
Humid tropical vertebrates are at lower risk of extinction and population decline in forests with higher structural integrity demonstrates why simply measuring forest cover can underestimate habitat degradation.
| Rodrigo Cámara-Leret et al. | Nature | 5 August 2020
New Guinea has the world's richest island flora documents extraordinary plant diversity and endemism on one of Earth's great tropical rainforest islands.
| Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute | Smithsonian Institution | 22 June 2020
Heights Unseen: The Hidden World of Tropical Rainforests describes research using canopy camera traps to study monkeys, opossums, kinkajous, and other animals high above the forest floor.
| Jos Barlow et al. | Nature | 25 July 2018
The future of hyperdiverse tropical ecosystems reviews the interacting threats facing some of Earth's most species-rich environments.
| Benjamin L. Turner et al. | Nature | 7 March 2018
Pervasive phosphorus limitation of tree species but not communities in tropical forests investigates the complex role of phosphorus in tropical tree growth.
| Tim Newbold et al. | Biodiversity and Conservation | 2017
Land-use effects on local biodiversity in tropical forests vary between continents compares biodiversity responses to secondary forests and plantations across tropical regions.
| Matthew J. Struebig et al. | Biological Conservation | April 2016
Life after logging in tropical forests of Borneo reviews how mammals and birds respond to selective logging and shows that logged forests retain considerable conservation value.
| Vincent S. F. T. Merckx et al. | Nature | 12 August 2015
Evolution of endemism on a young tropical mountain examines how the exceptional biodiversity of Mount Kinabalu in Borneo developed.
| Stephen P. Hubbell et al. | Smithsonian Research Online | 2013
Tropical rain forest conservation and the twin challenges of diversity and rarity discusses why the enormous number of uncommon tropical species complicates conservation planning.
| Luke Gibson et al. | Nature | 14 September 2011
Primary forests are irreplaceable for sustaining tropical biodiversity concludes that undisturbed forests consistently support substantially greater biodiversity than degraded substitutes.
| Jeff Tollefson | Nature | 1 June 2011
A new eye on biodiversity describes airborne remote-sensing technology designed to map the composition and condition of tropical ecosystems.
| Carlos A. Peres et al. | Biological Conservation | October 2010
Biodiversity conservation in human-modified Amazonian forest landscapes examines how forest fragmentation, logging, roads, agriculture, and other disturbances affect Amazonian wildlife.
| Scott A. Mangan et al. | Nature | 25 June 2010
Negative plant–soil feedback predicts tree-species relative abundance in a tropical forest investigates ecological mechanisms that help maintain extraordinary tropical tree diversity.
| Eldredge Bermingham, Christopher W. Dick and Craig Moritz | Smithsonian Libraries | 2005
Tropical Rainforests: Past, Present & Future brings together research on rainforest evolution, ecology, biogeography, species richness, human pressures, and conservation.
| Arnold Newman | Smithsonian Libraries | 2002
Tropical Rainforest: Our Most Valuable and Endangered Habitat examines rainforest structure, ecological interdependence, threats, sustainable use, and conservation.
Climate, Drought, Heat, and Water Stress
| Kei Yiu Lai et al. | npj Climate and Atmospheric Science | 2 June 2026
Early emergence of climate change in tropical rainforest temperature variability due to ENSO examines when human-driven warming becomes distinguishable from natural climate variability.
| Kristina J. Anderson-Teixeira and Krishna Anujan | Nature | 14 January 2026
Predicting the fate of tropical forests under intensifying heat discusses how recent drought experiments illuminate rainforest responses to future warming.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Environmental and Sustainability Indicators | 2026
Spatio-temporal climate variability impacts on vegetation greenness in the Kakamega tropical rainforest examines four decades of climate and vegetation change in Kenya.
| Yingzuo Qin et al. | Nature | 5 March 2025
Impact of Amazonian deforestation on precipitation reverses between seasons finds that forest clearing can increase wet-season rainfall while reducing rainfall during the dry season.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature | 2025
Hot droughts in the Amazon provide a window to a future hypertropical climate examines how increasingly hot droughts alter tree physiology, mortality, and forest functioning.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature | 2025
Hot droughts in the Amazon provide a window to a future hypertropical climate links recent Amazon droughts with climatic conditions expected to become more widespread under future warming.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Ecology & Evolution | 2025
Amazon rainforest adjusts to long-term experimental drought describes how forest structure stabilized after large trees died during a decades-long rainfall-exclusion experiment.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Climate Change | 2024
Novel temperatures are already widespread beneath the world's tropical forest canopies finds that climate change is altering even the relatively buffered environments beneath rainforest canopies.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Global Change Biology | 2024
Inferred drought-induced plant allocation shifts and their impact on drought legacy examines long-lasting carbon-cycle effects following drought in French Guiana.
| C. Smith et al. | Nature | 1 March 2023
Tropical deforestation causes large reductions in observed precipitation provides pan-tropical observational evidence linking forest loss to declining rainfall.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Climate Change | 2023
Sensitivity of South American tropical forests to an extreme climate anomaly assesses how unusually hot and dry conditions influence growth, mortality, and forest carbon storage.
| David Bauman et al. | Nature | 18 May 2022
Tropical tree mortality has increased with rising atmospheric water stress documents a long-term increase in mortality among Australian tropical rainforest trees.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Global Change Biology | 2022
Reduced ecosystem resilience quantifies fine-scale heterogeneity in tropical forest mortality responses to drought uses satellite measurements to map variation in forest drought vulnerability.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Communications | 2022
Global field observations of tree die-off reveal hotter-drought fingerprint for Earth's forests shows that warming intensifies drought-related tree mortality across forest biomes.
Evidence of Climate Changes in a Tropical Rainforest: Case Study Kakamega Tropical Rainforest documents warming and rainfall variability in western Kenya.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Global Ecology and Conservation | 2020
The impact of long dry periods on aboveground biomass documents how repeated drought-driven mortality can reverse tropical forest carbon accumulation.
| Izabela Aleixo et al. | Nature Climate Change | 22 April 2019
Amazonian rainforest tree mortality driven by climate and functional traits finds that drought, heat, storms, and extreme rainfall influence mortality differently among tree groups.
| Obbe A. Tuinenburg et al. | Geophysical Research Letters | 2019
Surface warming and atmospheric circulation dominate rainfall changes over tropical rainforests examines contrasting rainfall responses in Amazonia, the Congo, and New Guinea.
| Brendan Choat et al. | Nature | 27 June 2018
Triggers of tree mortality under drought reviews the physiological mechanisms responsible for drought-induced forest dieback.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Ecology Letters | 2017
Temperature and rainfall interact to control carbon cycling in tropical forests finds that rainfall effects depend strongly on forest temperature.
| Jan Verbesselt et al. | Nature Climate Change | 5 September 2016
Remotely sensed resilience of tropical forests uses satellite observations to assess how quickly tropical forests recover following climatic disturbance.
| Scott R. Saleska et al. | Nature | 16 March 2016
Dry-season greening of Amazon forests examines whether satellite observations accurately indicate increased Amazon vegetation activity during dry periods.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Trends in Plant Science | 2016
The Impacts of Droughts in Tropical Forests reviews physiological, ecological, and carbon-cycle consequences of increasing tropical drought.
| Christopher E. Doughty et al. | Nature | 4 March 2015
Drought impact on forest carbon dynamics and fluxes in Amazonia investigates how severe drought alters photosynthesis, respiration, growth, and mortality.
| David B. Rowland et al. | Nature | 2015
Death from drought in tropical forests is triggered by hydraulics not carbon starvation finds that failure of trees' water-transport systems is a principal mechanism of drought mortality.
| Deborah Lawrence and Karen Vandecar | Nature Climate Change | 18 December 2014
Effects of tropical deforestation on climate and agriculture reviews how forest clearing produces warmer, drier conditions and can reduce agricultural productivity.
| Cory C. Cleveland and Benjamin W. Sullivan | Nature | 12 September 2012
Drought and tropical soil emissions discusses how drought can alter greenhouse-gas emissions from tropical forest soils.
| D. V. Spracklen et al. | Nature | 5 September 2012
Observations of increased tropical rainfall preceded by air passage over forests shows that air masses passing over forests produce substantially more rainfall.
| Oliver L. Phillips et al. | New Phytologist | 2010
Drought-mortality relationships for tropical forests compares tree mortality responses across more than one hundred tropical forest monitoring plots.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Ecology | 2010
Experimental drought in a tropical rain forest increases soil carbon dioxide losses to the atmosphere examines how reduced rainfall changes tropical soil respiration.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B | 2008
The fate of assimilated carbon during drought examines how Amazon drought changes photosynthesis, respiration, decomposition, and ecosystem carbon exchange.
| Daniel C. Nepstad et al. | Ecology | 2007
Mortality of large trees and lianas following experimental drought in an Amazon forest demonstrates the particular vulnerability of large trees to prolonged moisture stress.
Spatial patterns and recent trends in the climate of tropical rainforest regions analyzes several decades of temperature and precipitation change across rainforest regions.
Carbon Storage and Forest Dynamics
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Global Change Biology | 2026
Long-term experimental drought in a tropical montane cloud forest investigates carbon cycling, tree physiology, nutrients, and reproduction under reduced soil moisture.
| Hannah Carle et al. | Nature | 15 October 2025
Aboveground biomass in Australian tropical forests now a net carbon source reports a long-term shift from carbon accumulation toward net biomass loss.
| Kali B. Middleby et al. | Global Change Biology | 2025
Local Adaptation Drives Leaf Thermoregulation in Tropical Rainforest Trees investigates how Australian rainforest trees cope with high leaf temperatures.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Journal of Ecology | 2024
Tropical forest above-ground productivity is maintained by nutrients cycled in litter reports results from a seventeen-year experiment manipulating rainforest litter.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Journal of Plant Nutrition and Soil Science | 2024
Intra-annual dynamics of soil and microbial C, N, and P pools examines seasonal nutrient fluctuations in Central Amazon rainforest soils.
| Yuan Wang et al. | Global Change Biology | September 2023
Elucidating climatic drivers of photosynthesis by tropical forests uses satellite fluorescence measurements to study controls on rainforest productivity.
| Julia Valentim Tavares et al. | Nature | 26 April 2023
Basin-wide variation in tree hydraulic safety margins predicts the carbon balance of Amazon forests links drought vulnerability to changes in Amazon forest carbon storage.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences | 2023
El Niño-Southern Oscillation forcing on carbon and water cycling in a Bornean tropical rainforest uses a decade of field observations to examine forest-atmosphere exchanges.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature | 2023
The carbon sink of secondary and degraded humid tropical forests measures carbon accumulation in recovering forests across Amazonia, Central Africa, and Borneo.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Communications | 2023
Tree mortality during long-term droughts is lower in structurally complex forest stands investigates how variation in forest structure can influence resistance to drought.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Frontiers in Environmental Science | 2023
Mapping deforestation and recovery of tropical montane forests of East Africa uses satellite records to track forest loss and regrowth in Kenya and Uganda.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Global Change Biology | 2023
Warming, drought, and disturbances lead to shifts in functional composition reconstructs thousands of years of ecological change in Amazonian and Andean forests.
| Hellen Fernanda Viana Cunha et al. | Nature | 10 August 2022
Direct evidence for phosphorus limitation on Amazon forest productivity provides experimental evidence that phosphorus availability constrains rainforest productivity.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Communications | 2022
Field-based tree mortality constraint reduces estimates of model-projected forest carbon sinks suggests that some models overestimate future tropical forest carbon sequestration.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Communications | 8 September 2020
Forest carbon sink neutralized by pervasive growth-lifespan trade-offs finds that faster tree growth is commonly associated with shorter lifespan.
| Wannes Hubau et al. | Nature | 4 March 2020
Asynchronous carbon sink saturation in African and Amazonian tropical forests finds that the carbon-absorbing capacity of intact tropical forests is weakening.
| Anja Rammig | Nature | 4 March 2020
Tropical carbon sinks are saturating at different times on different continents explains why the Amazon carbon sink weakened earlier than Africa's.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Communications | 2020
Tree mode of death and mortality risk factors across Amazon forests examines more than 120,000 trees to understand the ecological causes and consequences of tree mortality.
| Adriane Esquivel-Muelbert et al. | Global Change Biology | 2019
Compositional response of Amazon forests to climate change shows gradual increases in drought-associated tree taxa across long-term monitoring plots.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Global Change Biology | 2019
Post-fire recovery in a tropical forest examines vegetation and carbon dynamics following repeated experimental burning and wind disturbance in southeastern Amazonia.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Agricultural and Forest Meteorology | 15 December 2018
The surface-atmosphere exchange of carbon dioxide in tropical rainforests compares carbon fluxes across 13 rainforest sites.
| Edward T. A. Mitchard | Nature | 25 July 2018
The tropical forest carbon cycle and climate change explains the enormous role tropical forests play in absorbing and releasing atmospheric carbon.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | New Phytologist | 2018
Variation in hydroclimate sustains tropical forest biomass and promotes functional diversity explores links between precipitation variability, forest biomass, and ecological strategies.
| Xiaohui Feng et al. | Global Change Biology | 2018
Improving predictions of tropical forest response to climate change integrates Puerto Rican field observations with ecosystem models.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Communications | 2017
Long-term carbon sink in Borneo's forests halted by drought and vulnerable to edge effects shows that drought and fragmentation can temporarily or permanently reverse forest carbon uptake.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Communications | 2017
Long-term carbon sink in Borneo's forests halted by drought and vulnerable to edge effects documents decades of biomass measurements from Southeast Asian rainforest plots.
| Mohammed Alamgir et al. | Scientific Reports | 20 July 2016
Degraded tropical rain forests possess valuable carbon storage opportunities shows that some degraded forests can recover substantial carbon stocks.
| Lucy Rowland et al. | Global Change Biology | 14 July 2015
After more than a decade of soil moisture deficit finds that Amazon trees can maintain photosynthetic capacity while respiration costs increase.
| Feifei Zhu et al. | Scientific Reports | 21 January 2015
Phosphate addition enhanced soil inorganic nutrients examines interactions between nitrogen deposition, phosphorus availability, and soil fertility in tropical forests.
| Deborah A. Clark et al. | Global Change Biology | 2015
Terrestrial tropical forests and climate change reviews major uncertainties surrounding tropical forest carbon responses to warming, rainfall change, and rising atmospheric carbon dioxide.
| David B. Clark and Deborah A. Clark | Organization for Tropical Studies | 2012
The CARBONO Project describes long-term research into rainforest productivity, carbon cycling, and responses to climatic variation at La Selva, Costa Rica.
| Yadvinder Malhi | Journal of Ecology | 13 December 2011
The productivity, metabolism and carbon cycle of tropical forest vegetation reviews how tropical vegetation contributes to Earth's carbon cycle.
| Sean Michael Gleason et al. | Oecologia | April 2010
Species-soil associations, disturbance, and nutrient cycling in an Australian tropical rainforest examines relationships between soil fertility, plant specialization, cyclones, and ecosystem functioning.
| Julia Glenday | Forest Ecology and Management | 1 November 2006
Carbon storage and emissions offset potential in an East African tropical rainforest examines carbon sequestration opportunities in Kenya's Kakamega Forest.
| Louis S. Santiago et al. | Journal of Tropical Ecology | 27 June 2005
Nutrient cycling and plant-soil feedbacks along a precipitation gradient examines changes in nutrient availability across tropical forests receiving different amounts of rainfall.
| Guy Hilton | Forest Ecology and Management | December 1987
Nutrient cycling in tropical rainforests discusses the importance of conserving nutrient stocks when tropical forests are logged.
| John Proctor | Applied Geography | April 1987
Nutrient cycling in primary and old secondary rainforests reviews the diversity and complexity of nutrient-cycling strategies among tropical forests.
Deforestation, Logging, Roads, and Land-Use Change
| Michelle Sims et al. | World Resources Institute | 4 June 2026
New Data Shows What's Driving Forest Loss Around the World distinguishes permanent deforestation from temporary tree-cover disturbances and identifies their primary causes.
| Oscar Morton et al. | Nature | 3 June 2026
Mining triggers extensive additional deforestation in sub-Saharan Africa shows how mining produces forest loss extending well beyond mine sites.
| Elizabeth Goldman et al. | World Resources Institute | 29 April 2026
Tropical Rainforest Loss Slowed in 2025, but Fire is a Growing Threat to Forests Worldwide analyzes the newest global satellite measurements of primary tropical forest loss.
| Conservation International | Conservation International | 2026
Deforestation Facts provides an overview of the scale, causes, and environmental consequences of tropical forest destruction.
| Charles Barber | World Resources Institute | 9 July 2025
Organized Crime in the Amazon examines the growing role of illegal logging, mining, land grabbing, and criminal networks in rainforest destruction.
| Robert M. Ewers et al. | Nature | 17 July 2024
Thresholds for adding degraded tropical forest to the conservation estate identifies levels of logging at which disturbed forests continue to retain substantial biodiversity.
| Joeri A. Zwerts et al. | Nature | 10 April 2024
FSC-certified forest management benefits large mammals compared to non-FSC finds higher mammal encounter rates in certified logging concessions in equatorial Africa.
| Delphine Clara Zemp et al. | Nature | 24 May 2023
Tree islands enhance biodiversity and functioning in oil palm landscapes finds that patches of native trees can improve biodiversity within plantation landscapes.
| Muhammad Iqbal Lubis et al. | Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution | 2023
Landscape-scale conservation planning in Sumatra examines forest connectivity and habitat needs of tigers and other large mammals.
| Yadvinder Malhi et al. | Nature | 14 December 2022
Logged tropical forests have amplified and diverse ecosystem energetics shows that selectively logged Bornean forests can remain complex and biologically active ecosystems.
| J. Nicholas Hendershot et al. | Nature | 18 March 2020
Intensive farming drives long-term shifts in avian community composition examines how agricultural intensification alters tropical bird communities.
| Thomas K. Rudel | Environmental Conservation | 27 August 2014
Have tropical deforestation's changing dynamics created conservation opportunities? traces the historical transition from smallholder clearing to large-scale commercial drivers.
| William F. Laurance et al. | Smithsonian Institution | 20 May 2009
Smithsonian Scientists Say Roads Are the Number-One Threat to World's Tropical Rainforests explains how road construction opens forests to logging, hunting, settlement, mining, and agricultural expansion.
| Researchers from INPA and collaborating institutions | Atmospheric Environment | September 1995
A tropical rainforest clearing experiment by biomass burning in the Manaus region quantifies carbon emissions produced when Amazon forest is cleared and burned.
Restoration and Secondary Forests
| Jiaqi Li et al. | Nature Ecology & Evolution | 20 August 2026
Variation in the costs and ecological benefits of tropical natural forest regeneration maps where natural forest recovery could provide especially large biodiversity and carbon benefits at comparatively low cost.
| Lourens Poorter and Tomonari Matsuo | Nature | 8 April 2026
Young tropical forests help to reverse biodiversity losses describes evidence that naturally regenerating forests can regain much of their biodiversity within several decades.
| Nature Index | Nature Portfolio | 2026
Ecological Restoration of Tropical Forests summarizes research into passive regeneration, tree planting, biodiversity recovery, carbon sequestration, and ecosystem restoration.
| Nature Index | Nature Portfolio | 2026
Natural Regeneration and Restoration of Tropical Forest Ecosystems reviews the ecological and economic importance of allowing native forests to recover naturally.
| Robin L. Chazdon et al. | Nature Reviews Biodiversity | 22 April 2025
Drivers and benefits of natural regeneration in tropical forests reviews how abandoned and degraded tropical lands recover vegetation, wildlife, carbon storage, and ecosystem services.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Global Change Biology | 2025
Persistent Effects of Landscape Context on Recruitment Dynamics During Secondary Succession shows that surrounding forest and dispersal corridors continue to influence tree recruitment decades into recovery.
| Tomiwa V. Oluwajuwon et al. | Frontiers in Forests and Global Change | 10 July 2024
Bibliometric and literature synthesis on assisted natural regeneration reviews more than two hundred studies examining approaches for accelerating tropical forest recovery.
| Rainforest Alliance | Rainforest Alliance | 14 March 2023
Our Mission to Protect the World's Forests explains approaches combining forest protection, sustainable agriculture, and community livelihoods.
| Rainforest Alliance | Rainforest Alliance | 2023
Forests & Biodiversity explains the importance of tropical forests for terrestrial biodiversity, carbon storage, rainfall, and human livelihoods.
| Chaofan Zhou et al. | Journal of Environmental Management | 2023
Assessing the recovery in species, size and location diversities of a lowland tropical rainforest examines recovery after shifting cultivation using multiple measures of forest structure and diversity.
| Kennedy Muthee et al. | Frontiers in Forests and Global Change | 3 January 2022
A Review of Global Policy Mechanisms Designed for Tropical Forests Conservation and Climate Risks Management evaluates major international approaches to conserving tropical forests.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Frontiers in Forests and Global Change | 2022
Assisted restoration interventions drive functional recovery of tropical wet forest tree communities finds that strategic tree planting can speed functional recovery where natural regeneration is slow.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Frontiers in Conservation Science | 2022
Incorporating a palaeo-perspective into Andean montane forest restoration argues that understanding historical forest dynamics can improve modern restoration strategies.
| Lourens Poorter et al. | Science | 10 December 2021
Multidimensional tropical forest recovery analyzes 77 sites and finds that soil and ecosystem functioning recover considerably faster than biomass and original species composition.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Frontiers in Environmental Science | 2021
Tropical Rainforest Successional Processes Can Facilitate Successful Recovery examines the restoration of extremely degraded former mining landscapes.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Ecology & Evolution | 2020
A policy-driven framework for conserving the best of Earth's remaining moist tropical forests maps areas of exceptionally high structural integrity and conservation importance.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Science of the Total Environment | 2020
Spatial and environmental constraints on natural forest regeneration examines more than seven decades of tropical secondary-forest recovery and highlights limitations created by missing seed dispersers.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Global Ecology and Conservation | January 2018
Long lasting impressions finds that biodiversity differences caused by logging and agricultural clearing can remain evident even after thirty years of rainforest regeneration.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Brazilian Journal of Biology | 2017
Soil macrofauna density and diversity across a chronosequence of tropical forest restoration examines how soil animal communities change as Atlantic rainforest regenerates.
| Víctor Arroyo-Rodríguez et al. | Biological Reviews | 5 November 2015
Multiple successional pathways in human-modified tropical landscapes explains why tropical secondary forests follow different recovery trajectories depending on landscape condition and land-use history.
| Luke P. Shoo et al. | Conservation Biology | 21 October 2015
Slow recovery of tropical old-field rainforest regrowth examines the limitations of natural regeneration and circumstances in which active restoration can accelerate recovery.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | PLOS ONE | 2013
Succession of ephemeral secondary forests examines how short-lived secondary forests contribute to plant diversity within heavily modified tropical landscapes.
| Karen D. Holl | Nature Education Knowledge | 2013
Restoring Tropical Forest explains passive regeneration, active planting, seed dispersal limitations, and the ecological constraints governing rainforest restoration.
Fragmentation and Forest Edges
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Communications | 2026
The safety margin of small-scale tree cover loss in global fragmented forests examines when incremental forest loss begins producing measurable declines in ecosystem structure and functioning.
| Sam Hending et al. | Animal Conservation | 2026
Impact of Forest Fragmentation and Associated Edge Effects on Tropical Forest Biodiversity uses ecoacoustic monitoring to measure biodiversity changes in Madagascar.
| Frontiers editors | Frontiers | 2026
Fragmentation and Degradation in Tropical Forests brings together research on biodiversity, carbon, ecosystem functioning, disturbance, and recovery.
| Robert J. Fletcher Jr. | Nature | 12 March 2025
Biodiversity declines across fragmented forests discusses evidence that fragmentation produces biodiversity losses beyond those caused by forest area loss alone.
| Charles J. Marsh et al. | Science | 10 January 2025
Tropical forest clearance impacts biodiversity and function, whereas logging changes structure compares dozens of ecosystem indicators across intact, logged, and oil-palm landscapes in Borneo.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Ecology & Evolution | 2025
A globally consistent negative effect of edge on aboveground forest biomass shows that forest-edge environments generally contain less biomass than forest interiors.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature | 10 July 2024
Human degradation of tropical moist forests is greater than previously estimated uses satellite and LiDAR observations to reveal widespread and persistent degradation inside remaining tropical forests.
| Simon Harold | Nature Ecology & Evolution | 13 July 2023
Mixed picture for global forests discusses recent trends in forest fragmentation, including especially rapid fragmentation across major tropical biodiversity regions.
| Richard T. Corlett et al. | Biological Conservation | February 2021
Lessons in ecology and conservation from a tropical forest fragment in Singapore reviews nearly two centuries of ecological change in Bukit Timah Nature Reserve.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Communications | 2021
Recovery of logged forest fragments in a human-modified tropical landscape during the 2015–16 El Niño examines the interaction between fragmentation and severe drought in Malaysian Borneo.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Global Ecology and Conservation | September 2020
Tropical forest fragmentation and isolation finds that Amazon bird communities undergo rapid and non-random changes after forest fragments become isolated.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Forest Ecology and Management | 1 November 2018
Effects of logging on wildlife communities in certified tropical rainforests examines camera-trap evidence from production forests in East Kalimantan.
| Franziska Taubert et al. | Nature | 14 February 2018
Global patterns of tropical forest fragmentation identifies roughly 130 million tropical and subtropical forest fragments and explores how additional clearing could increase fragmentation.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Biotropica | 2018
Selective logging intensity in an East African rain forest predicts reductions in ant diversity examines how logging alters tropical insect communities in Kenya.
| Marion Pfeifer et al. | Nature | 1 November 2017
Creation of forest edges has a global impact on forest vertebrates finds that edge creation alters the abundance of the majority of studied forest vertebrate species.
| Fritz Kleinschroth and John R. Healey | Biotropica | 19 June 2017
Impacts of logging roads on tropical forests reviews how roads cause forest loss, fragmentation, wildlife disturbance, hunting access, and additional deforestation.
| Katharina Brinck et al. | Nature Communications | 17 March 2017
High resolution analysis of tropical forest fragmentation and its impact on the global carbon cycle estimates substantial additional carbon losses caused by forest-edge effects.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Scientific Reports | 2017
Forest edge disturbance increases rattan abundance in tropical rain forest fragments shows how fragmentation can shift plant-community structure as well as reduce biodiversity.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Land Use Policy | 2017
Forest fragmentation reduced carbon storage in a moist tropical forest in Bangladesh compares tree and soil carbon between continuous and fragmented forests.
| Jos Barlow et al. | Nature | 29 June 2016
Anthropogenic disturbance in tropical forests can double biodiversity loss from deforestation demonstrates that logging, fire, and fragmentation can greatly magnify biodiversity losses.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Communications | 2015
Degradation in carbon stocks near tropical forest edges estimates that biomass is substantially lower near tropical forest boundaries than in forest interiors.
| Rico Fischer et al. | Global Ecology and Conservation | January 2015
Tropical forest degradation and recovery in fragmented landscapes models long-term changes in tree communities, carbon storage, evapotranspiration, and runoff.
| William F. Laurance et al. | Biological Conservation | 2011
The fate of Amazonian forest fragments synthesizes more than three decades of experiments examining the long-term ecological consequences of fragmentation.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | PLOS ONE | 2011
Forest Fragmentation and Selective Logging Have Inconsistent Effects on Multiple Animal-Mediated Ecosystem Processes examines pollination, seed dispersal, predation, decomposition, and other processes in Kenya's Kakamega Forest.
| Rico Fischer et al. | Ecological Modelling | 2011
Fragmentation drives tropical forest fragments to early successional states models how edge effects gradually alter Atlantic Forest tree communities.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Basic and Applied Ecology | 6 October 2008
Fragmentation and local disturbance of forests reduce frugivore diversity and fruit removal documents disrupted seed-dispersal interactions in Kenya's Kakamega Forest.
| William F. Laurance et al. | Nature | 20 April 2000
Rainforest fragmentation kills big trees reports disproportionate mortality of large canopy and emergent trees along Amazonian forest fragments.
Tropical forest fragmentation and greenhouse gas emissions shows that fragmentation can produce carbon emissions beyond those caused directly by forest clearing.
| William D. Newmark | Conservation Biology | March 1991
Tropical Forest Fragmentation and the Local Extinction of Understory Birds documents bird losses from small rainforest fragments in Tanzania's Eastern Usambara Mountains.
Wildlife, Seed Dispersal, and Defaunation
| Jesús Aguirre-Gutiérrez et al. | Nature Reviews Biodiversity | 8 July 2026
Remote sensing delivers tropical forest resilience monitoring for the Global Biodiversity Framework explains how satellites, LiDAR, and other remote-sensing tools can detect changes in rainforest resilience.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | BMC Plant Biology | 2026
Seed dispersal and predation of the African walnut tree compares ecological interactions in intact and hunted Central African rainforests.
| Nature Index | Nature Portfolio | 2026
Defaunation Effects on Tropical Forest Ecosystems summarizes research showing how hunting and wildlife decline disrupt seed dispersal, vegetation structure, and carbon storage.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Frontiers in Science | 2026
Nature Positive: halting and reversing biodiversity loss toward restoring Earth system stability identifies protection of Amazon, Congo Basin, and Southeast Asian rainforests as a major global biodiversity priority.
| Frontiers editors | Frontiers | 2026
Emerging Technologies for Biodiversity Conservation in Tropical Forests examines remote sensing, artificial intelligence, acoustic monitoring, restoration technology, and community stewardship.
| Nature Index | Nature Portfolio | 2026
Ecosystem Rehabilitation and Land Use Dynamics in Tropical Forests reviews interactions between agriculture, mining, infrastructure, land tenure, and ecological restoration.
| Natalia Mesa-Sierra et al. | Frontiers in Environmental Science | 7 January 2025
Restoration of tropical dry forest analyzes nearly two hundred studies to identify ecological and social factors controlling restoration success.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Frontiers in Plant Science | 2024
Assessing the functional vulnerability of woody plant communities within a large-scale tropical rainforest dynamics plot examines functional differences among forest patches affected by logging and fragmentation.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Ecology | 2022
Defaunation changes leaf trait composition of recruit communities in tropical forests shows how hunting can gradually alter the functional characteristics of rainforest tree communities.
| Peter Jeffrey Williams et al. | Nature Communications | 12 March 2021
Fungi and insects compensate for lost vertebrate seed predation finds ecological compensation among seed predators following mammal loss in a Bornean rainforest.
| Frontiers editors | Frontiers in Forests and Global Change | 2021
Enhancing Natural Regeneration to Restore Landscapes brings together research on passive and assisted regeneration as alternatives to large-scale tree planting.
| Edzo Veldkamp et al. | Nature Reviews Earth & Environment | 15 September 2020
Deforestation and reforestation impacts on soils in the tropics reviews how forest removal and recovery transform soil carbon, nutrients, structure, and biological processes.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Scientific Reports | 2020
Small vertebrates are key elements in the frugivory networks of a hyperdiverse tropical forest demonstrates that smaller birds and mammals can play disproportionately important roles in seed dispersal.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Scientific Reports | 2019
Defaunation of large-bodied frugivores reduces carbon storage in a tropical forest of Southeast Asia links wildlife loss with reduced dispersal of large-seeded, carbon-rich trees.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Global Ecology and Conservation | 2017
A pantropical assessment of vertebrate physical damage to forest seedlings examines an overlooked way that wildlife shapes tree recruitment in Peru, Gabon, and Borneo.
| Miguel Martínez-Ramos et al. | Frontiers in Ecology and Evolution | 31 August 2016
Anthropogenic disturbances jeopardize biodiversity conservation within tropical rainforest reserves discusses how human pressures can undermine biodiversity even inside nominally protected forests.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Frontiers in Plant Science | 2016
Experimental Biodiversity Enrichment in Oil-Palm-Dominated Landscapes in Indonesia describes a major experiment testing whether tree islands can restore biodiversity and ecosystem functioning.
Amazon Rainforest
| Rhett Ayers Butler | Mongabay | 28 May 2026
The Amazon's path from crisis to durability argues that lasting conservation requires functioning governance, Indigenous rights, enforcement, finance, and ecological monitoring.
| Rhett Ayers Butler | Mongabay | 20 June 2025
World Rainforest Day and the state of Earth's most vital rainforests surveys the condition of the Amazon and other major rainforest regions.
| Researchers from multiple institutions | Nature Communications | 2025
How climate change and deforestation interact in the transformation of the Amazon rainforest examines combined disruptions to the rainforest's water, energy, and carbon cycles.
| Alexandre de Santi | Mongabay | 30 December 2024
The Amazon in 2025 reviews drought, wildfire, deforestation, illegal mining, carbon markets, and restoration initiatives across the basin.
| Umberto Lombardo et al. | Nature | 8 April 2020
Early Holocene crop cultivation and landscape modification in Amazonia provides evidence that people were modifying southwestern Amazon landscapes more than 10,000 years ago.
African Rainforests
| Mongabay staff | Mongabay | June 2026
Four years to earn their trust describes bonobo research and conservation work inside Salonga National Park in the Democratic Republic of Congo.
| Mongabay staff | Mongabay | April 2026
A conservationist's mission to turn around Salonga's fate examines efforts to protect Africa's largest tropical rainforest national park.
| Ruth Kamnitzer | Mongabay | 26 November 2025
DRC hit by record deforestation in 2024 examines agriculture, mining, wildfire, conflict, and other pressures on Congo Basin forests.
| Yannick Garcin et al. | Nature | 2 November 2022
Hydroclimatic vulnerability of peat carbon in the central Congo Basin shows that past drying caused peat decomposition and provides warnings about future climate change.
| Mongabay staff | Mongabay | August 2021
L.A.-sized tract of primary forest went up in flames in DRC province documents unusual forest burning and increasing pressure on forests in Sankuru.
| Maxime Réjou-Méchain et al. | Nature | 21 April 2021
Unveiling African rainforest composition and vulnerability to global change maps millions of Central African trees and identifies regions vulnerable to climate and human pressures.
| Greta C. Dargie et al. | Nature | 11 January 2017
Age, extent and carbon storage of the central Congo Basin peatland complex reveals one of the world's largest tropical peat-carbon deposits.
| Lucie M. Rogo et al. | ATREE / Smithsonian Repository | 2001
An integrated conservation initiative to conserve Kakamega Forest and its biodiversity describes efforts to protect Kenya's exceptional rainforest biodiversity.
Asian and Australasian Rainforests
| Hans Nicholas Jong and Niken D. Sitoningrum | Mongabay | 31 July 2026
Palm oil expansion reignites decade-old Indigenous land conflict in Indonesia examines tensions between plantation development, forest protection, and customary land rights.
| Hans Nicholas Jong and Irfan Maulana | Mongabay | 29 July 2026
Indonesia shows elevated fire hotspot activity in 2026 examines wildfire risk associated with drought, peatlands, and a potential strong El Niño.
| Carolyn Cowan | Mongabay | 15 July 2026
Warming world could push Southeast Asia forests toward thermal limits reports research suggesting regional rainforests are approaching physiological temperature thresholds.
| Loren Bell | Mongabay | 28 January 2014
Through careful management, Indigenous people have shaped Asian rainforests for 11,000 years describes evidence of long-term human management of Southeast Asian rainforest landscapes.
| Rhett Ayers Butler | Mongabay | 13 November 2007
Law enforcement key to saving Borneo's rainforests examines the role of governance and enforcement in preventing illegal logging and forest destruction.
Indigenous Peoples and Rainforest Communities
| Rhett Ayers Butler | Mongabay | 14 August 2026
Among the sacred hills of Colombia's Guainía explores the ecological and cultural importance of forest landscapes maintained by Indigenous communities.
| World Rainforest Fund | World Rainforest Fund | 2026
Study links protecting Indigenous peoples' lands to greater nonhuman primate biodiversity summarizes research connecting Indigenous stewardship with higher primate diversity and lower extinction risk.
| Charles Barber et al. | World Resources Institute | 26 November 2025
The Tropical Forests Forever Facility Could Finally Finance Nature Conservation examines a proposed global mechanism for rewarding tropical countries that maintain forests.
Rainforest Conservation and Global Trends
| Mongabay | Mongabay | 22 June 2026
World Rainforest Day: Deforestation must be nearly halved to meet 2030 target reviews global progress toward international forest-protection commitments.
| Han Xu et al. | Nature | 2026
The importance of competition and facilitation for global tree diversity examines how interactions among trees help shape species-rich forests, including tropical rainforest communities.
| Rhett Ayers Butler | Mongabay | 24 December 2024
The year in tropical rainforests: 2024 reviews major developments in deforestation, wildfire, conservation policy, restoration, carbon markets, and forest science.
| Rhett Ayers Butler | Mongabay | 29 December 2022
What happened in the world's rainforests in 2022? surveys global rainforest conservation successes, setbacks, and policy developments.
| Rhett Ayers Butler | Mongabay | June 2020
The world's great rainforests provides an overview of the Amazon, Congo, New Guinea, Borneo, and other major rainforest regions.
| Rhett Ayers Butler | Mongabay | December 2016
The year in tropical rainforests: 2016 reviews major forest trends across Latin America, Africa, and Asia.
| Smithsonian Institution | Smithsonian Institution | 2009
Rainforests Regrowing: Impact on Extinction Rates Sparks Debate examines whether widespread secondary-forest regrowth can compensate for continued destruction of primary rainforest.
Additional Research and Background
| World Resources Institute | World Resources Institute | 2026
Conserving and Restoring Forests and Healthy Landscapes summarizes global forest trends and strategies for restoration, biodiversity conservation, and climate mitigation.
| Rainforest Alliance | Rainforest Alliance | 2026
Rainforest Alliance Insights collects current research and analysis on tropical forests, sustainable agriculture, biodiversity, community forestry, and climate resilience.
| Nature Portfolio | Nature Portfolio | 2026
Tropical Ecology collects current peer-reviewed studies on rainforest ecology, biodiversity, species interactions, climate change, land use, and conservation.
Tropical Forests News provides continuing coverage of rainforest conservation, wildlife, deforestation, Indigenous rights, logging, agriculture, mining, restoration, and climate change.
Rainforests and Amazon News provides extensive reporting on Amazon ecology, conservation, deforestation, Indigenous territories, drought, fire, and restoration.
Deforestation and Amazon News follows current forest-loss measurements, conservation policies, agricultural expansion, fires, roads, mining, and land-use conflicts.
| Nature Index | Nature Index | 2026
Deforestation Dynamics and Land Use Change in Tropical Forests summarizes major scientific questions surrounding agriculture, logging, mining, infrastructure, degradation, and secondary forest recovery.
| Drew E. Terasaki Hart et al. | Nature | 27 August 2025
Global phenology maps reveal the drivers and effects of seasonal asynchrony investigates geographic variation in flowering and other biological seasonal cycles relevant to tropical ecosystems.
| Marcell K. Peters et al. | Nature | 27 March 2019
Climate–land-use interactions shape tropical mountain biodiversity and ecosystem functions examines Mount Kilimanjaro to show how land use and climate interact across tropical elevation gradients.
| Mohammed Alamgir et al. | Scientific Reports | 20 July 2016
Degraded tropical rain forests possess valuable carbon storage opportunities demonstrates the potential climate and biodiversity benefits of rehabilitating degraded rainforest.
