Pyro-ecophysiology: Shifting the paradigm of live wildland fuel research

66Citations
Citations of this article
104Readers
Mendeley users who have this article in their library.

Abstract

The most destructive wildland fires occur in mixtures of living and dead vegetation, yet very little attention has been given to the fundamental differences between factors that control their flammability. Historically, moisture content has been used to evaluate the relative flammability of live and dead fuels without considering major, unreported differences in the factors that control their variations across seasons and years. Physiological changes at both the leaf and whole plant level have the potential to explain ignition and fire behavior phenomena in live fuels that have been poorly explained for decades. Here, we explore how these physiological changes violate long-held assumptions about live fuel dynamics and we present a conceptual model that describes how plant carbon and water cycles independently and interactively influence plant flammability characteristics at both the leaf and whole plant scale. This new ecophysiology-based approach can help us expand our understanding of potential plant responses to environmental change and how those physiological changes may impact plant flammability. Furthermore, it may ultimately help us better manage wildland fires in an uncertain future.

Author supplied keywords

References Powered by Scopus

Get full text
274Citations
424Readers

This article is free to access.

On the need for a theory of wildland fire spread

205Citations
195Readers
Get full text

Cited by Powered by Scopus

This article is free to access.

Get full text

This article is free to access.

Register to see more suggestions

Mendeley helps you to discover research relevant for your work.

Already have an account?

Cite

CITATION STYLE

APA

Matt Jolly, W., & Johnson, D. M. (2018). Pyro-ecophysiology: Shifting the paradigm of live wildland fuel research. Fire, 1(1), 1–5. https://doi.org/10.3390/fire1010008

Readers over time

‘18‘19‘20‘21‘22‘23‘24‘2506121824

Readers' Seniority

Tooltip

PhD / Post grad / Masters / Doc 40

56%

Researcher 25

35%

Professor / Associate Prof. 6

8%

Lecturer / Post doc 1

1%

Readers' Discipline

Tooltip

Environmental Science 27

42%

Agricultural and Biological Sciences 21

33%

Earth and Planetary Sciences 13

20%

Engineering 3

5%

Save time finding and organizing research with Mendeley

Sign up for free
0