Recent studies published online in ‘Nature Geoscience’ have revealed that some tropical forests may show resilience in the face of global warming. This is because tropical forests are less likely to lose biomass, i.e. plants and plant material in response to greenhouse gas emissions over the world.Though the results suggest that the risk of climate-induced damage to tropical forests will be relatively small, a lot more research is still required to quantify the physiological response of tropical forest ecosystems to climate change. The study was aimed in part at determining the future evolution of tropical rain forests — including the role they play in the global climate system and the carbon cycle.
The research team included climate scientists and tropical ecologists from the UK, USA, Australia and Brazil and was led by Dr. Chris Huntingford, with the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology in the UK. The research team looked into computer simulations with 22 climate models to explore the response of tropical forests in the Americas, Africa and Asia to the severe greenhouse-gas-induced climate change.
“The big surprise in our analysis is that uncertainties in ecological models of the rainforest are significantly larger than uncertainties from differences in climate projections,” said Huntingford, a researcher. “Despite this we decided to conclude, based on current knowledge of expected climate change and ecological response and remarkable variability in forest sensitivity, that there is enough evidence of forest resilience for the Americas (Amazonia and Central America), Africa and Asia.”
However it is important to note that other factors such as fire and deforestation are not included in the study. Some scientists believe that these left out factors may also affect the carbon stored in tropical forests though their impacts are also difficult to simulate. Forests are believed to store about 45 percent of the carbon found on land.
Moreover, rapid shifts in eco-systems, particularly through vegetation die-offs could be among the most striking impacts of increased drought and climate change around the globe. Co-author Dr David Galbraith from the University of Leeds said, "This is why we must improve our understanding of how tropical forests respond to extreme weather, increasing temperature and droughts.
Co-author Dr Lina Mercado from the University of Exeter and the Centre for Ecology & Hydrology said, "Building on this study, one of the big challenges is to include a full representation of thermal acclimation and adaptation of the rainforest to warming."
