Rita Sousa-SilvaUniversity of Freiburg | Albert-Ludwigs-Universität Freiburg · Freiburg Institute for Advanced Studies (FRIAS)
Rita Sousa-Silva
Ph.D. in Forest Ecology
About
27
Publications
10,836
Reads
How we measure 'reads'
A 'read' is counted each time someone views a publication summary (such as the title, abstract, and list of authors), clicks on a figure, or views or downloads the full-text. Learn more
768
Citations
Citations since 2017
Introduction
My research interests are focused on the role of tree species diversity for the functioning of forest ecosystems, from natural forests to urban environments. Currently, I am working on how urban green spaces relate to health and well-being, and how we can use this knowledge to plan and manage green spaces for multiple services and benefits.
In my Ph.D., I investigated the impacts of drought on temperate forests, and the significance of tree diversity for the health and growth of mature forests.
Additional affiliations
August 2019 - present
March 2018 - February 2019
Institute of Temperate Forest Sciences (ISFORT)
Position
- PostDoc Position
May 2014 - February 2018
Education
May 2014 - August 2018
September 2010 - November 2012
September 2007 - July 2010
Publications
Publications (27)
Urban tree planting initiatives have been blooming worldwide to help tackle climate change and nurture healthy living environments for people and biodiversity. Many initiatives are characterized by ambitious targets based on the number of trees planted but are not defined by clear objectives, which hampers the success of these initiatives in achiev...
As the climate continues to warm and the world becomes more urbanized, our reliance on trees and the benefits they provide is rapidly increasing. Many cities worldwide are planting trees to offset rising temperatures, trap pollutants, and enhance environmental and human health and well-being. To maximize the benefits of planting trees and avoid fur...
BACKGROUND AND AIM: Fine particles (PM2.5) have been associated with childhood asthma onset. Trees have been suggested to reduce PM2.5 levels in urban settings. However, the influence of the urban forest on asthma onset is unclear as trees can reduce air pollution but also emit pollen and biogenic organic compounds. We aim to characterize the influ...
Urban forests are associated with important ecosystem services, such as reduced environmental exposure and improved human health. These benefits will become even more important with climate change, especially with most humans now living in cities. Yet urban trees are themselves threatened by the changing climate, unprecedented urban growth and new...
As of 2020, the world has an estimated 290 million ha of planted forests and this number is continuously increasing. Of these, 131 million ha are monospecific planted forests under intensive management. Although monospecific planted forests are important in providing timber, they harbor less biodiversity and are potentially more susceptible to dist...
In the past two decades, forest management has undergone major paradigm shifts that are challenging the current forest modelling architecture. New silvicultural systems, guidelines for natural disturbance emulation, a desire to enhance structural complexity, major advances in successional theory, and climate change have all highlighted the limitati...
Exposure to allergenic tree pollen is an increasing environmental health issue in urban areas. However, reliable, well-documented, peer-reviewed data on the allergenicity of pollen from common tree species in urban environments are lacking. Using the concept of ‘riskscape’, we present and discuss evidence on how different tree pollen allergenicity...
The influence of the urban forest on asthma onset is unclear as trees reduce air pollution but also emit pollens and biogenic organic compounds. Additionally, rudimentary vegetation data have so far been used to assess risks. We aimed to assess associations between residential urban forest characteristics and the onset of childhood asthma. We used...
Abstract Human impacts on Earth’s ecosystems have greatly intensified in the last decades. This is reflected in unexpected disturbance events, as well as new and increasing socio-economic demands, all of which are affecting the resilience of forest ecosystems worldwide and the provision of important ecosystem services. This Anthropocene era is forc...
Key message
Trees display contrasting specialized annual shoots during their life-span and along with ontogeny-driven modifications in their branching pattern, they can fulfill different combinations of light exploitation and space exploration functions
Abstract
Tree ontogeny is related to major changes in tree structure and function at different...
Background: Worldwide, halting biodiversity loss is still a major challenge. Climate and land-use change (CLUC) are major drivers of species decline, and further expected to drive species’ future ranges. Understanding how these changes may impact species in the future is thus of utmost importance in the context of conservation and monitoring. This...
Purpose:
Droughts are expected to become more intense and frequent. Mixed forests can be more resilient to extreme events, but are the individual trees in mixed forests also more resilient to drought?
Methods:
We sampled 275 trees in 53 temperate forest stands in northern Belgium: monocultures, two-species mixtures, and the three-species mixture...
Resilience is becoming increasingly important for forest management, describing the ability of a forest to maintain its fundamental structure and functioning despite altered by disturbances. Droughts, in particular, are a major cause of concern. Forest resilience is closely tied to tree species diversity, anchored in the notion that a wide range of...
Understanding the processes that underlie drought‐related tree vitality loss is essential for anticipating future forest dynamics, and for developing management plans aiming at increasing the resilience of forests to climate change. Forest vitality has been continuously monitored in Europe since the acid rain alert in the 1980s, and the intensive m...
Climate change will impact forests and may impair their ability to provide essential ecosystem services in the decades to come. Addressing this challenge requires adjustments to forest management strategies as of now, but it is still unclear to what extent this is already in progress. Using data from surveys of 1131 forest owners and managers from...
Ongoing declines in biodiversity caused by global environmental changes call for adaptive conservation management, including the assessment of habitat suitability spatiotemporal dynamics potentially affecting species persistence. Remote sensing (RS) provides a wide-range of satellite-based environmental variables that can be fed into species distri...
Background
Climate change is likely to cause significant modifications in forests. Rising to this challenge may require adaptation of forest management, and therefore should trigger proactive measures by forest managers, but it is unclear to what extent this is already happening. Methods
The survey carried out in this research assesses how forest s...
In a changing climate, forests face diverse types and levels of stress. Therefore, regular tree health monitoring is vital. But in the analyses of vitality monitoring data series, little attention has been paid to the interaction of species mixture and the effects of these stressors. For this reason, we revisited the trends in defoliation and disco...
Ensuring forest protection and the delivery of forest ecosystem services is a central aim of the European Union’s biodiversity strategy for 2020. Therefore, accurate modelling and mapping of ecosystem services as well as of biodiversity conservation value is an important asset in support of spatial planning and policy implementation. The objectives...
Earthworms have a significant influence on the structure, composition and functioning of forest ecosystems, but in spite of their role as ecosystem engineers, little is known on the factors controlling their distribution across European forests. Optimised sampling techniques, as well as more advanced statistical tools and geographical information s...
Question
Can very high-resolution colour orthophotography and digital surface models (DSMs) from an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) be effectively used for assessment of habitat extent and condition in fine-scale disturbance-dependent mosaics?
Location
Serra de Arga mountain range, a Natura 2000 protected site in the NW region of Portugal where dra...
The on-going declines in biodiversity caused by global and local environmental changes call for improved monitoring and conservation schemes. Remote-sensing (RS) of earth surface stands at the forefront to tackle this challenge, by providing data at different spatial and temporal resolutions that can be related with a wide range of environmental va...
Species distribution models (SDMs) are increasingly used to understand rare and endangered species distributions, as well as the environmental pressures affecting them. Detailed knowledge of their distribution is critical for reporting its conservation status, and SDMs are potential tools to provide the relevant information to conservation practiti...
Rare species are growing as one of the main issues of concern in the effort to conserve biodiversity worldwide, since these species are assumed to undergo higher risk of extinction. Rare species are characterized by restricted geographic ranges, habitat specialization and/or small population sizes. Their distribution datasets usually have small num...
Projects
Project (1)
Diversity-productivity and diversity-stability hypotheses are tested and mechanistically clarified from field measurements and remote sensing data in different research setups including newly established experimental plantations, selected exploratory plots in mature forests and existing forest inventories. This work includes the PhD projects of Bjorn Rombouts, Rita Silva, Thomas Van de Peer, Astrid Vannoppen.
