Feldpausch Research Group

In category: El Niño


China Scholarship Council and University of Exeter PhD Scholarships 2027 entry

中国国家留学基金委和英国埃克塞特大学合作奖学金(博士生项目) Prof Ted Feldpausch is recruiting students for the China Scholarship Council and University of Exeter PhD Scholarships. Full-time PhD scholarships are available in collaboration with the China Scholarship Council (CSC), for September 2027/28 entry. Available PhD Projects The PhD projects focus on a range of themes related to fire, land-use change, tree mortality, carbon cycling, and forest […]


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The Amazon’s hottest days are warming more than twice as fast as its average, in new areas of concern

A new study in Communications Earth & Environment, co-authored at Exeter, shows that Amazonia’s climate extremes are changing far faster than its averages, and that the fastest-changing region is the central-north Amazon, far from the arc of deforestation.


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Burned Amazonian forests stay altered for at least 40 years, new lidar study shows

New spaceborne-lidar work presented at ATBC 2026 shows Amazonian forests in Acre remain measurably shorter, simpler and lower in biomass for at least 40 years after wildfire, recovering to only about 90% of unburned forest.


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Fire reduces tree diversity and carbon in seasonal forests of the southern Amazon

We recently published a paper led by PhD student Maurivan Barros Pereira (State University of Mato Grosso (UNEMAT)), supervised by Prof. Ted Feldpausch and co-supervised by Drs Ben Hur Marimon and Fernando Elias da Silva. The findings were published in the journal Forest Ecology and Management, “Post-fire changes in tree diversity, composition and carbon in […]


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New artwork highlights forests damaged by deforestation and wildfire

Artwork developed by our Amazon Past Fire and Amazon PyroCarbon Projects, funded by UK NERC and ODA grants, was shown at a new artwork exhibit to highlight deforestation and wildfire. Tipping Point, by Bristol artist Luke Jerram, combined smoke, lights and sound to simulate forest fires. The installation ran at the University of Bristol’s Botanic […]


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Post-doc to model soil carbon and fire in tropical forests

This opportunity has closed. For current PhD and postdoctoral opportunities in the Feldpausch group, see Opportunities. We are recruiting for a Postdoctoral Research Associate to model soil carbon and fire in tropical forests. Summary of the Role We wish to recruit a Postdoctoral Research Associate to support the work of Profs Richard Betts, Ted Feldpausch, […]


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Extreme El Niño weather saw South America’s forest carbon sink switch off

Tropical forests in South America lose their ability to absorb carbon from the atmosphere when conditions become exceptionally hot and dry, according to new research. For a long time, tropical forests have acted as a carbon sink, taking more carbon out of the air than they release into it, a process that has moderated the impact […]


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Fire training reaches 300 high-school students in Cruzeiro do Sul, Acre

As part of the NERC-funded Amazon Past Fire project, we coordinated a training session with university students in the secondary education teaching programme at the Federal Universidade de Acre, Brazil, about fire impacts, management, and sustainable forest use in Brazil.


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Workshop Exchange of Knowledge and Teaching on Burning in the Amazon, Confresa, MT-Brazil (video)

The Municipal Secretary of Education of Confresa offered the event “I Workshop Exchange of Knowledge and Teaching on Burning in the Amazon”, which took place on February 22, 23 and 24, 2023, in the face-to-face format at the municipality of Confresa, MT. Funded by the University of Exeter (UK) and the Natural Environmental Research Council, […]


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Ancient fires enhance Amazon forest drought resistance

In our recent paper, “Ancient fires enhance Amazon forest drought resistance” published in Frontiers in Forests and Global Change, we studied if ancient fires can alter the response of Amazonian forests to drought events.


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Fully funded PhD opportunity: Soil carbon dynamics following Amazon Forest fires: quantifying the role of fire severity and charcoal, NERC GW4+ DTP PhD

This opportunity has closed. For current PhD and postdoctoral opportunities in the Feldpausch group, see Opportunities. This project is one of a number that are in competition for funding from the NERC Great Western Four+ Doctoral Training Partnership (GW4+ DTP).  The GW4+ DTP consists of the Great Western Four alliance of the University of Bath, […]


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QUEX Workshop: Fire Regimes in Tropical and Sub-Tropical Peatlands During the Holocene

A two-day hybrid workshop (both online and in-person) was held on 25th and 26th November 2021 that included 20 participants from different institutions in the United Kingdom, Australia, Colombia, Spain, and Brazil.


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Reading fire history and carbon loss from charcoal in burned Amazon forests

Research at the University of Exeter examines how measurements of charcoal reflectance can be used to understand fire regimes and carbon dynamics in tropical forests in South America.


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Fires from 2015 El Niño drought burned “fire-resistant” wet forests in central Amazonia

A new study by Pontes-Lopes et al. 2021 examining the impacts of the record-breaking drought and fires caused by the 2015/2016 El Niño has found that even the wet forests of central Amazonia, forests considered relatively fire-resistant, were affected by fire.


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