Evidence map›Paper›PMID 41359837›Full record

ArticleProceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America2025

Amazon forest faces severe decline under the dual pressures of anthropogenic climate change and land-use change.

Selma Bultan, Yiannis Moustakis, Sebastian Bathiany, Niklas Boers, Raphael Ganzenmüller, Gergana Gyuleva, Julia Pongratz

Abstract read
In one paragraph

Article in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 2025. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 4 papers.

0numbers the graph read from it
0cells of the map it votes in
4citing papers in PubMed
–field-weighted citation impact
1 · What the graph read from it

What it found

Each row is one number read from the abstract, on the scale the paper reported it, with its interval. Left of the dashed line favours the treatment, right favours the comparator. Under each row is the sentence it came from. New to these charts? A ten-minute tutorial.

The abstract states no effect estimate the extractor could read, or names no intervention and outcome on the map, so this paper lights no cell and moves no belief. It is still indexed, cited and linked below.

2 · The registry

The trial behind it

Trials whose registry record cites this paper, or whose number appears in the abstract. A trial that started after this paper was published is citing it as background, not reporting it.

Neither the registry nor the abstract names a trial number. If this is a trial report, that itself is worth knowing.

3 · Its place in the literature

Who cites it

4 citing papers in PubMed.

  1. Article
  2. Article
  3. Article
  4. Amazon forest faces severe decline under the dual pressures of anthropogenic climate change and land-use change.Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America · 2025
    Article
4 · The record

Corrections and comments

PubMed lists nothing against this paper. Absence here is not a guarantee, only a check that was made.

5 · Who and what money

Authors and funding

7 authors.

Selma BultanDepartment of Geography, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich 80333, Germany.ORCID 0000-0002-9191-9906
Yiannis MoustakisDepartment of Geography, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich 80333, Germany.ORCID 0000-0002-4448-2967
Sebastian BathianyDepartment of Aerospace and Geodesy, School of Engineering and Design, Technical University Munich, Ottobrunn 85521, Germany.ORCID 0000-0001-9904-1619
Niklas BoersDepartment of Aerospace and Geodesy, School of Engineering and Design, Technical University Munich, Ottobrunn 85521, Germany.
Raphael GanzenmüllerDepartment of Geography, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich 80333, Germany.ORCID 0000-0002-2337-0915
Gergana GyulevaInstitute of Atmospheric and Climate Science, ETH Zurich, Zurich 8092, Switzerland.ORCID 0009-0001-0829-2023
Julia PongratzDepartment of Geography, Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität, Munich 80333, Germany.

Funding

Deutsches Klimarechenzentrum (DKRZ) bm1240EC | ERC | HORIZON EUROPE European Research Council (ERC) 101137601
6 · The paper itself

Abstract

The Amazon is a key climate system component, hotspot of biodiversity and many other ecosystem functions. However, progressive rainforest degradation, driven by anthropogenic climate change and land-use change, is increasing the risk of a large-scale critical ecosystem transition. Previous studies highlight forest vulnerability to isolated or combined climate change and land-use pressures, but have not disentangled individual driver contributions. This crucial knowledge gap needs to be addressed for a holistic understanding of the risks that the rainforest is facing. Combining Earth System Model data with a robust detection and attribution framework, we assess forest decline under individual and combined pressures of climate change and land-use change. We assess abrupt shifts and nonlinearities in local and basin-wide forest decline to reveal signs of resilience loss and potentially imminent forest transitions. We identify land-use change as the dominant driver of past degradation, accounting for 80% of the historical (1950 to 2014) forest decline. Future projections reveal that up to 38% of the mid-20th century forest area could be lost by 2100, with 25% caused by continued deforestation and 13% caused by unmitigated global warming. Importantly, the risk of abrupt rather than gradual forest decline increases as global warming progresses, with a strong nonlinear trend beyond a threshold of 2.3°. These findings highlight a substantial risk of a large-scale transition, with potentially devastating consequences for the global climate system, regional water and carbon cycles, human livelihoods, and biodiversity. Limiting this risk requires rigorous forest protection and climate mitigation in line with the Paris Agreement.

Indexed as

Amazon rainforestclimate changeclimate tipping elementsland-use change

Identifiers

PMID41359837
PMCPMC12718304

What OpenQuestion holds

Textmetadata
LicenceCC BY-NC-ND
Read underepoch 390

Registered trials

None linked

Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.