ISSN 1758-678X
In this Issue
TopEditorial
Top-
Crossing the threshold
Avoiding dangerous climate change is an increasingly formidable challenge. Diplomats meeting next month in Durban must propose a persuasive alternative if they are to end the Kyoto Protocol.
Commentaries
Top-
Making an action film
Do films such as Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth really make any difference to how we think and feel about climate change?
-
A walk on the wild side
Feeding a growing population in a hotter world will require exploiting a far broader range of crop diversity than now — and that means valuing wild genes.
News Feature
Top-
Show me the money
Funding for climate change research is looking healthy despite austerity measures and conservatives clamouring for cuts. Nature Climate Change looks at the data.
Correction
TopBooks and Arts
TopInterview
Top-
Future forest
As Brazil debates relaxing its strong forestry laws, Nature Climate Change discusses the implications with Amazon ecologist Thomas Lovejoy, professor of environmental science at George Mason University and Biodiversity Chair at the Heinz Center in Washington DC.
Policy Watch
Top-
A biofuel conundrum
As scientists raise alarming questions about the true carbon cost of some biofuels, policymakers must decide how best to promote low-emission versions, reports Sonja van Renssen.
Market Watch
Top-
Vital statistics
A new report warns of the environmental impact of Asia's rise. But the relationship between pollution and economic growth is not simple, argues Anna Petherick.
Research Highlights
Top-
Tropical forests: Hot and thirsty
-
Sociology: Jobs versus environment
-
Mitigation: Gas or coal?
-
Inorganic chemistry: Approaching photosynthesis
-
Statistics: Blame it on the weather
-
Deforestation: Deforestation changes rainfall
-
Microbiology: Fungi for fuel
-
Economics: Cost of deforestation
-
Mitigation: Car pool
News and Views
Top-
Mitigation: Plausible mitigation targets
Whether the widely accepted 2 °C limit for climate change is practically achievable depends partly on climate sensitivity, but predominantly on complex socio-economic dynamics.
See also: Letter by Joeri Rogelj et al.
-
Ecology: Moving farther and faster
The distributions of terrestrial organisms are shifting in response to climate change. Research shows that these changes are happening at a much faster rate than previously estimated.
-
Biodiversity and ecosystems: Change at the community level
Some commercial fish species of the northeast Atlantic Ocean have relocated in response to warming. The impact of warming on marine assemblages in the region may already be much greater than appreciated, however, with over 70% of common demersal fish species responding through changes in abundance, rather than range.
-
Mitigation: Monitoring informs management
Improved regional monitoring and reporting of greenhouse-gas emissions depends on accurate estimates of emissions from different land-use regimes. An analysis suggests that measuring emissions per crop yield may be an optimum metric for refining land-management decisions.
Perspectives
Top-
Shrinking body size as an ecological response to climate change
It is well recognized that species are shifting their distributions and the timing of key life events in response to climate change. What is less appreciated is that many species are also experiencing reductions in body size, with implications for food availability and the balance of ecosystems. This Perspective looks at the evidence for shrinking body size across endothermic and ectothermic organisms and proposes future research directions.
-
Projections of when temperature change will exceed 2 °C above pre-industrial levels
Climate change projections are usually presented as ‘snapshots’ of change at a particular time in the future. Now a new approach to presenting projections, which should prove useful to policymakers, shows when temperature thresholds might be crossed, shifting the emphasis from ‘what might happen’ to ‘when it might happen’.
Letters
Top-
Emission pathways consistent with a 2 °C global temperature limit
The ‘pathway’ the world needs to follow to limit global temperature rise to 2 °C remains uncertain. Analysis that takes technical and economic constraints on reducing emissions into account indicates that emissions need to peak in the next decade and then fall rapidly to have a good chance of achieving this goal.
See also: News and Views by Neil Edwards
-
Regional carbon dioxide implications of forest bioenergy production
Substituting fossil fuels with bioenergy from forests, as well as thinning forests to reduce wildfire emissions, has been proposed as a means of cutting carbon dioxide emissions. A study based on inventory data for US West Coast forests now challenges this proposal, and finds that it could lead to 2–14% higher emissions than current management practices over the next 20 years.
Beyond Boundaries
Top-
Stunted by climate
With expertise in geography and human health, Marta Jankowska and David López-Carr worked with a team of specialists in climate science, statistics, demography and policy to study climate change impacts on child malnutrition in Mali.