One of the many consequences of tropical deforestation includes forest fragmentation, a process that involves dividing forests into smaller and smaller pieces, creating new borders between habitats.
These borders are exposed to different environmental and biological conditions, called “edge effects,” than compared to more favorable conditions within forest interiors.
Edge effects can include variations in sunlight exposure and precipitation, leading to overall modifications in forest structure over time as some tree species thrive and others die as a result of disturbed growing conditions. With tropical forests playing such a major role in the global carbon budget, it’s important to better understand how edge effects change fragmented forests.Carbon in oil palm plantations vs forests.
In a new study published today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers from Arizona State University’s Center for Global Discovery and Conservation Science and Harvard University utilized high-tech maps produced by the center's Global Airborne Observatory to investigate the impact of edge effects on forest structure and tree canopy characteristics along boundaries between lowland rainforests and oil palm plantations in Malaysian Borneo.
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