Treefall gap, canopy opening caused by the death of one or more trees, is the dominant form
of disturbance in many forest systems worldwide. Gaps play an important role in forest …

Recent studies have demonstrated the increasingly important role of lianas (woody vines) in
forest regeneration, species diversity and ecosystem-level processes, particularly in the …

Metacommunity ecology links smaller-scale processes that have been the provenance of
population and community ecology—such as birth-death processes, species interactions …

Ecology Letters (2011) 14: 397–406 Abstract Tropical forests are experiencing large‐scale
structural changes, the most apparent of which may be the increase in liana (woody vine) …

The relationship between species richness and ecosystem function, as measured by
productivity or biomass, is of long‐standing theoretical and practical interest in ecology. This …

Background The palm family occurs in all tropical and sub-tropical regions of the world.
Palms are of high ecological and economical importance, and display complex spatial …

Background Temperate forest understorey vegetation poses an excellent study system to
investigate whether increases in resource availability lead to an increase in plant species …

One of the main goals in ecology is determining the mechanisms that control the abundance
and distribution of organisms. Using data from 69 tropical forests worldwide, I demonstrate …

Abstract The “Height Variation Hypothesis” is an indirect approach used to estimate forest
biodiversity through remote sensing data, stating that greater tree height heterogeneity (HH) …

Summary 1 Regeneration in forest canopy gaps is thought to lead invariably to the rapid
recruitment and growth of trees and the redevelopment of the canopy. Our observations …