Combined Insults Spell Trouble for Rainforests

Scientists are now saying that a combination of interacting factors--including forest fragmentation, logging, and El Niño-driven drought--has altered the fire regimes of tropical forests and is changing regional climates and reconfiguring the landscape. These interactions are synergistic, they say--that is, the whole is greater than the sum of its parts. The concept provides a new paradigm for understanding the dynamics of fragmented rainforests and for approaching their conservation.