Fire affects and is affected by plants. Vegetation varies in flammability, that is, its general ability to burn, at different levels of ecological organization. To scale from individual plant traits to community flammability states, understanding trait effects on species flammability variation and their interaction is important. Plant traits are the cumulative result of evolution and they show,...

Recurrent fires impose a strong selection pressure in many ecosystems worldwide. In such ecosystems, plant flammability is of paramount importance because it enhances population persistence, particularly in non-resprouting species. Indeed, there is evidence of phenotypic divergence of flammability under different fire regimes. Our general hypothesis is that flammability-enhancing traits are ada...

Tropical grasses fuel the majority of fires on Earth. In fire-prone landscapes, enhanced flammability may be adaptive for grasses via the maintenance of an open canopy and an increase in spatiotemporal opportunities for recruitment and regeneration. In addition, by burning intensely but briefly, high flammability may protect resprouting buds from lethal temperatures. Despite these potential ben...

Relationships between the flammability properties of a given plant and its chances of survival after a fire still remain unknown. We hypothesize that the bark flammability of a tree reduces the potential for tree survival following surface fires, and that if tree resistance to fire is provided by a thick insulating bark, the latter must be few flammable. We test, on subalpine tree species, the ...

This study proposes a procedure for a risk analysis for leakages of flammable refrigerants into a poorly ventilated three-dimensional space. It also presents several test cases of risk analyses on flammability and ignitions to a leaked refrigerant. Concentration of a leaked flammable refrigerant at a leakage window, Cin, is determined by mass balance, providing information on the capacity of an...

The growing implementation of exhaust gas recirculation (EGR) in reducing NO(x) emissions of engine is of paramount motivation to perform a fundamental research on the flammability characteristics of fuel-air-diluent mixtures. In this work, the influences of EGR on the flammability region of natural gas-air-diluent flames were experimentally studied in a constant volume bomb. An assumption of c...

Wildfires have been occurring in terrestrial ecosystems since the early evolution of plants (Bowman et al., 2009; Pausas & Keeley, 2009; Bond & Scott, 2010) and have shaped many species and ecosystems worldwide (Keeley et al., 2011). Plant flammability is an important driver of fire in terrestrial ecosystems and thus has a fundamental role in ecosystem dynamics and species evolution (Belcher et...

Studies examining plant flammability descriptors as fire-adaptive traits (e.g., Schwilk, 2003; Scarff & Westoby, 2006; Cowan & Ackerly, 2010; Saura-Mas et al., 2010; Pausas et al., 2012) are normally formulated within the framework of inclusive fitness theory. In such framework, flammabilityenhancing traits are considered to favour individuals if the elevated flammability confers fitness benefi...

There has been considerable recent interest in the flammability hazards of aircraft wire and cable. This study evaluates the fire hazards associated with of eight commercial electrical wires used in the aerospace industry. Heat release, flammability, smoke, current overload, and toxicity are evaluated using standard and modified procedures. The results are compared to current regulations (1998)...

The flammability of plant leaves influences the spread of fire through vegetation. Exotic plants invading native vegetation may increase the spread of bushfires if their leaves are more flammable than native leaves. We compared fresh-leaf and dry-leaf flammability (time to ignition) between 52 native and 27 exotic plant species inhabiting dry sclerophyll forest. We found that mean time to ignit...