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A new interactive map reveals how deforestation is driving dangerous local warming across the tropics — with implications for health, agriculture, and climate resilience. Tropical forests are often called the lungs of the Earth, but they’re also its air conditioners. When trees are cut down, the cooling benefits they provide – through shade and...
Research from Restoring Hardknott Forest and Wild Ingleborough has contributed to a new paper summarising the current knowledge of creating woodland through natural processes in Great Britain. The synthesis was part of the TreE_PlaNat project and combined the expertise of 31 practitioners and researchers to compile 15 case studies where woodland has been created...
Planting trees on a large scale in the UK, as part of pathways to achieving net-zero greenhouse gas emissions, could bring substantial changes to biological emissions from our woodlands, but the scale of change and the compounds emitted varies with tree species planted. New woodlands play a key role in proposed pathways to achieving net-zero...
Ingleborough National Nature Reserve (NNR) has become part of the King’s Series of National Nature Reserves and will be expanded to include 1186 hectares of land. Yorkshire’s iconic upland landscape will be secured for nature, boosting wildlife recovery and public access. Ingleborough National Nature Reserve (NNR) has habitats that are home to nationally significant wildlife populations...
Deforestation in tropical countries could contribute to increased deaths from heat exposure in nearby populations, new research has shown. Published today in the journal Nature Climate Change, the research was led by Dr Carly Reddington and Professor Dominick Spracklen, from the University of Leeds’ School of Earth and Environment. The study, which analysed areas across Central and South...
A peatland complex in the Congo Basin which is known to be a globally important carbon store is twice as old as previously thought, according to a new scientific study. An international team of researchers has shown that the tropical peatland complex, which is the world’s largest, began forming about 42,000 years ago, more than...
Scientists have used clues locked into tree rings to reveal major changes in the Amazon’s rainfall cycle over the last 40 years which show that wet seasons are getting wetter and dry seasons drier. Oxygen isotope signals in rings from two Amazon tree species allowed the international research team led by the University of Leeds...
Pupils from Millom School have been getting their hands dirty as part of a forestry restoration project in the Duddon Valley. They have been planting trees and wildflowers, setting up remote camera traps to observe birds and mammals, and working with local farmers during their six sessions with the Restoring Hardknott Forest Project. Restoring Hardknott...
Professor Phillips writes about the discovery of the 35-meter-tall giant ‘hiding in plain sight’ in the intact Amazon rainforest of southeastern Peru. Amazonia has at least 7,000 different tree species compared to just a few dozen in the United Kingdom. However, the discovery of a new tree species only occurs occasionally, and collections of flowers...
ForestPlots.net, the global network of tropical forest scientists led by Leeds, is working with the European Space Agency (ESA) to verify its Biomass satellite mission. The ESA Biomass satellite, which was launched in April 2025, uses a cutting-edge radar to scan dense forest canopies and measure tree trunks, branches, and stems, to detect the carbon...