Philippa Kaur

RESEARCH BRIEFINGS
08 May 2024

By using volunteers to map roads in forests across Borneo, Sumatra and New Guinea, an innovative study shows that existing maps of the Asia-Pacific region are rife with errors. It also reveals that unmapped roads are extremely common — up to seven times more abundant than mapped ones. Such ‘ghost roads’ are promoting illegal logging, mining, wildlife poaching and deforestation in some of the world’s biologically richest ecosystems. More

Renata Libonati argues in a World View article that megafires are here to stay, and that widespread prescribed burns are needed to manage the risk (Nature 627, 10; 2024). We agree on the problem, but disagree on the solutions.
Competing Interests
The authors declare no competing interests. More

Large, ancient ‘monumental’ trees are important ambassadors for nature conservation. Besides their symbolic value, they have overcome more ecological challenges than most of their younger relatives, and so might hide evolutionary secrets to mitigate the impacts of climate change (O. Pasques and S. Munné-Bosch Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 121, e2317866121; 2024).
Competing Interests
The authors declare no competing interests. More

RESEARCH BRIEFINGS
03 May 2024

A study provides insights into how energy flows in the food webs that connect soil- and canopy-dwelling organisms in tropical ecosystems with high biodiversity. When rainforest is converted to plantations, food webs are simplified and restructured, leading to profound changes in tropical-ecosystem functioning. More

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RESEARCH HIGHLIGHT
30 April 2024

Daisy, a member of a breed used to find fungal delicacies, detected a critically endangered Australian fungus faster than a trained human could. More

The global zoo community purports to act sustainably, as champions of conservation and research. Yet, in our view, this is a fallacy. Zoos remain mainly entertainment venues.
Competing Interests
The authors declare no competing interests. More