The Biota Cerrado Network stands out as a major initiative for environmental conservation. The network brings together research groups in Brazil and abroad dedicated to studying the biodiversity of the biome. Additionally, it promotes the high-level training of a significant number of professionals in the field.

Coordinated by Professor Guarino Colli from the Department of Zoology (ZOO/IB/UnB), the network consists of five main areas: Biological Inventories, Climate Change, Integrated Fire Management, Ecological Restoration, and Public Engagement with Science.

The Biota Cerrado Network is not limited to Brazilian territory. It collaborates with several foreign institutions, such as the Research Institute for Development in Montpellier (France), the American Museum of Natural History (USA), Ben Gurion University of the Negev (Israel), the University of Lisbon (Portugal), the University of Oxford (England), among others. These international partnerships expand the reach of research and contribute to a global perspective on the challenges faced by the Cerrado.

The Biota Cerrado Network is supported by the Biodiversity Research Program (PPBio) and the National Institutes of Science and Technology (INCTs) program of the Ministry of Science, Technology, and Innovations (MCTI). This integration has been crucial for promoting conservation policies and biome management, as well as for training highly qualified professionals. The goal is to generate knowledge that enables society to make informed decisions affecting the biodiversity of the Cerrado.

The ISLETS project will bring together an open access functional trait database, focusing on traits involved in resource use in island plants globally. This database will complement other databases that are already in place for continental species and will thus allow for new comparisons to improve our understanding of the unique evolution that occurs on islands. Moreover, functional trait diversity of island plants will enable new tests of the prediction that island plants are weak competitors, shedding new light on the widespread success of invasive species on islands. Detailed information at https://www.fondationbiodiversite.fr/en/the-frb-in-action/programs-and-projects/le-cesab/islets/ (Photo by Claire Fortunel)

FIRE-ADAPT is a project funded by the Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions Staff Exchanges 2021 scheme within the Horizon Europe funding programme from the European Union (HORIZON-MSCA-2021-SE). It comprises an expertise network whose objective is to quantify, monitor and evaluate the impact of Integrated Fire Management (IFM) on carbon dynamics, biodiversity and cultural ecosystem services in different tropical and subtropical regions with altered fire regimes under IFM.
The project is coordinated by Nuria Prat (Pau Costa Foundation) and Imma Oliveras Menor (AMAP/IRD).
Detailed information at https://www.fireadapt.eu

The Amazon is the most important biome of South America, harbouring extraordinarily high levels of biodiversity and providing important ecosystems services. This biome is particularly notable for evolving independently from fire and in a moist, warm climate. In recent decades, altered fire regimes and an increasingly hotter and drier climate has pushed this key biome towards ecological thresholds that will likely lead to major losses in biodiversity and ecosystem services. Similarly, the ecotonal forests at the Amazon-Cerrado transition are unique ecosystems in terms of form and function, but they may be the first to suffer large-scale tree mortality and species loss due to the combined effects of increased anthropogenic disturbance, altered fire regimes and a drier climate.
Vulnerability of fire and droughts are closely intertwined in Amazonian and transitional forests because fires in this region only occur when there is water stress and a human ignition source. Thus, drought increases vulnerability to fire, but we do not yet understand the magnitude and spatial variation of these vulnerabilities. Once a forest burns there is immediate tree mortality, but recent evidence also shows a significant time-lagged mortality that can last for decades, becoming an important carbon source. However, the mechanistic processes that lead to time-lagged tree mortality in this myriad of forest ecosystems encompassing the Amazon biome and the Amazon-Cerrado transition are still poorly understood. We also lack knowledge on how these processes might vary spatially across the biome and its transition. A better understanding of the mechanisms that lead to tree mortality after fires and droughts is needed to design future policies that emphasise nature-based solutions including restoration and natural regeneration.
This project uses aims at deciphering the mechanisms that underly vulnerability to fire and time-lagged post-fire mortality across the tropical forests in Amazon and Amazon-Cerrado transition. To achieve this aim, we quantify fire vulnerability at three different scales and link them through an upscaling approach. First, we identify the ecological mechanisms that explain why individuals and species die after fires occur. Second, at the community scale, we examine how vegetation structure, community traits and microclimate affect the probability to burn. Third, we predict the vulnerability of the Amazon forests and Amazon-Cerrado transitional forests. This information will be directly applicable for the detection of sensitive hotspots (areas particularly vulnerable to fire) through satellite products. We will deliver quantifiable early-warning metrics of ecosystem vulnerability to fire that can be mapped and incorporated into fire management policies.

This project is led by Dr. Imma Oliveras Menor (U.Oxford, IRD), with Manoela Machado as postdoctoral research assistant (U. Oxford, Woods Hole Climatic Research Centre) , Prof Jos Barlow (U. Lancaster) and Prof Yadvinder Malhi (U. Oxford) as co-investigators, and eight other partner institutions from Brazil, US and UK

Building on a unique dataset across the Neotropics and Palaeotropics, we will perform an in-depth analysis to decipher o the role of evolutionary factors on plant community composition and ecosystem net primary productivity. This information will help on predicting the vulnerability of tropical ecosystems to global change. It will also allow to identify taxonomic clades that may be most resilient to changes in climate and disturbance regimes, with potential for informing future restoration practices in the tropics. With 2021 being the first year for the UN decade of restoration, this study will provide novel and timely knowledge to help restoring degraded or altered tropical forest ecosystems with suitable native species. THe project is co-led by Dr Imma Oliveras Menor and Dr Claire Fortunel.