TY - JOUR
T1 - Tropical forests in the Americas are changing too slowly to track climate change
AU - Author Collaboration "Tropical forests in the Americas are changing too slowly to track climate change"
AU - Aguirre-Gutiérrez, Jesús
AU - Díaz, Sandra
AU - Rifai, Sami W.
AU - Corral-Rivas, Jose Javier
AU - Nava-Miranda, Maria Guadalupe
AU - González-M, Roy
AU - Hurtado-M, Ana Belén
AU - Revilla, Norma Salinas
AU - Vilanova, Emilio
AU - Almeida, Everton
AU - de Oliveira, Edmar Almeida
AU - Alvarez-Davila, Esteban
AU - Alves, Luciana F.
AU - de Andrade, Ana Cristina Segalin
AU - Lola da Costa, Antonio Carlos
AU - Vieira, Simone Aparecida
AU - Aragão, Luiz
AU - Arets, Eric
AU - Aymard C, Gerardo A.
AU - Baccaro, Fabrício
AU - Bakker, Yvonne Vanessa
AU - Baker, Timothy R.
AU - Bánki, Olaf
AU - Baraloto, Christopher
AU - de Camargo, Plínio Barbosa
AU - Berenguer, Erika
AU - Blanc, Lilian
AU - Bonal, Damien
AU - Bongers, Frans
AU - Bordin, Kauane Maiara
AU - Brienen, Roel
AU - Brown, Foster
AU - Prestes, Nayane Cristina C.S.
AU - Castilho, Carolina V.
AU - Ribeiro, Sabina Cerruto
AU - de Souza, Fernanda Coelho
AU - Comiskey, James A.
AU - Valverde, Fernando Cornejo
AU - Müller, Sandra Cristina
AU - da Costa Silva, Richarlly
AU - do Vale, Julio Daniel
AU - de Andrade Kamimura, Vitor
AU - de Oliveira Perdiz, Ricardo
AU - Del Aguila Pasquel, Jhon
AU - Derroire, Géraldine
AU - Di Fiore, Anthony
AU - Disney, Mathias
AU - Farfan-Rios, William
AU - Fauset, Sophie
AU - Klipel, Joice
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2025 American Association for the Advancement of Science. All rights reserved.
PY - 2025/3/7
Y1 - 2025/3/7
N2 - Understanding the capacity of forests to adapt to climate change is of pivotal importance for conservation science, yet this is still widely unknown. This knowledge gap is particularly acute in high-biodiversity tropical forests. Here, we examined how tropical forests of the Americas have shifted community trait composition in recent decades as a response to changes in climate. Based on historical trait-climate relationships, we found that, overall, the studied functional traits show shifts of less than 8% of what would be expected given the observed changes in climate. However, the recruit assemblage shows shifts of 21% relative to climate change expectation. The most diverse forests on Earth are changing in functional trait composition but at a rate that is fundamentally insufficient to track climate change.
AB - Understanding the capacity of forests to adapt to climate change is of pivotal importance for conservation science, yet this is still widely unknown. This knowledge gap is particularly acute in high-biodiversity tropical forests. Here, we examined how tropical forests of the Americas have shifted community trait composition in recent decades as a response to changes in climate. Based on historical trait-climate relationships, we found that, overall, the studied functional traits show shifts of less than 8% of what would be expected given the observed changes in climate. However, the recruit assemblage shows shifts of 21% relative to climate change expectation. The most diverse forests on Earth are changing in functional trait composition but at a rate that is fundamentally insufficient to track climate change.
KW - Biology
KW - Ecosystems Research
UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/86000674518
U2 - 10.1126/science.adl5414
DO - 10.1126/science.adl5414
M3 - Journal articles
C2 - 40048518
AN - SCOPUS:86000674518
SN - 0036-8075
VL - 387
JO - Science (New York, N.Y.)
JF - Science (New York, N.Y.)
IS - 6738
M1 - eadl5414
ER -
SDG 13 Climate Action