The potential influence of diversity on ecosystem structure and function remains a topic of significant debate, especially for tropical forests where diversity can range widely. We used Center for Tropical Forest Science (CTFS) methodology to establish forest dynamics plots in montane wet forest and lowland dry forest on Hawai'i Island. We compared the species diversity, tree density, basal are...

in the present study, randomly amplified polymorphic dna (rapd) markers were used to analyze the genetic diversity in 20 varieties of philodendron. the polymerase chain reaction was performed with 60 rapd primers, out of which 21 primers showed clear amplification as well as more polymorphism. in total, 354 scorable rapd loci with 348 polymorphic bands (98%) were observed. percentages of polymo...

In the present study, the aboveground biomass of the understorey vegetation of boreal coniferous forests was modelled according to the percentage cover. A total of 224 observations from 22 stands in upland forests and 195 observations from 14 different studies in peatland forests were utilized for the present analyses. The relationships between biomass and percentage cover can be used in ecosys...

There is widespread concern that fire exclusion has led to an unprecedented threat of uncharacteristically severe fires in ponderosa pine (Pinus ponderosa Dougl. ex. Laws) and mixed-conifer forests of western North America. These extensive montane forests are considered to be adapted to a low/moderate-severity fire regime that maintained stands of relatively old trees. However, there is increas...

Current research efforts to understand the relative invasibility of different plant communities have mostly ignored tropical forests. Only a few studies have treated invasive species in tropical forests, and recent worldwide analyses have not provided clear predictions concerning the relative invasibility of tropical forests. In this review, the extent to which exotic species have invaded tropi...

Animal-plant interactions are important for the recovery of diversity and processes in secondary forests, which increasingly dominate the tropical landscape. We used a combination of observational and experimental approaches to study the interactions of ants with diaspores across a successional gradient of forests in Southern Brazil, from August 2007 to April 2008. In addition to diaspore remov...

moderate resolution imaging spectroradiometer (modis) have been widely used for active fire detection in the world as the specific channels used for the fire detection have made the modis images applicable. the main objective was to explore the capability of modis images for active fire detection in the zagross forests using the modis contextual algorithm. the study was performed in the marivan...

In 1966 Eugene P. Odum delivered a speech before the Ecological Society of America that transformed the way ecologists looked at succession. His comparison of mature and successional systems lead ecologists to place secondary forests in an inferior position relative to mature ones to the point that today, prominent tropical biologists argue for and against the conservation value of secondary fo...

UNLABELLED BACKGROUND Unmanaged or old-growth forests are of paramount importance for carbon sequestration and thus for the mitigation of climate change among further implications, e.g. biodiversity aspects. Still, the importance of those forests for climate change mitigation compared to managed forests is under controversial debate. We evaluate the adequacy of referring to CO2 flux measurem...