An estimate of the number of tropical tree species

• DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1423147112
• Publication Date: 2015-06-02T15:08:47Z
• Authors: J. W. Ferry Slik; Víctor Arroyo-Rod...; Shin-Ichiro Aiba; Patricia Alvarez-...; Luciana F. Alves; Peter Ashton; Patricia Balvanera; Meredith L. Bastian; Peter J. Bellingham; Eduardo van den Berg; Luis Bernacci; Polyanna da Conce...; Lilian Blanc; Katrin Böhning-Gaese; Pascal Boeckx; Frans Bongers; Brad Boyle; Matt Bradford; Francis Q. Brearley; Mireille Breuer-N...; Sarayudh Bunyavej...; Darley Calderado ...; Miguel Castillo-S...; Eduardo L. M. Cat...; Shauna-Lee Chai; Yukai Chen; Robert K. Colwell; Robin L. Chazdon; Connie Clark; David B. Clark; Deborah A. Clark; Heike Culmsee; Kipiro Damas; Handanakere S. Da...; Gilles Dauby; Priya Davidar; Saara J. DeWalt; Jean-Louis Doucet; Alvaro Duque; Giselda Durigan; Karl A. O. Eichhorn; Pedro V. Eisenlohr; Eduardo Eler; Corneille Ewango; Nina Farwig; Kenneth J. Feeley; Leandro Ferreira; Richard Field; Ary T. de Oliveir...; Christine Fletcher; Olle Forshed; Geraldo Franco; Gabriella Fredrik...; Thomas Gillespie; Jean-François Gillet; Giriraj Amarnath; Daniel M. Griffith; James Grogan; Nimal Gunatilleke; David Harris; Rhett Harrison; Andy Hector; Jürgen Homeier; Nobuo Imai; Akira Itoh; Patrick A. Jansen; Carlos A. Joly; Bernardus H. J. d...; Kuswata Kartawinata; Elizabeth Kearsley; Daniel L. Kelly; David Kenfack; Michael Kessler; Kanehiro Kitayama; Robert Kooyman; Eileen Larney; Yves Laumonier; Susan Laurance; William F. Laurance; Michael J. Lawes; Ieda Leao do Amaral; Susan G. Letcher; Jeremy Lindsell; Xinghui Lu; Asyraf Mansor; Antti Marjokorpi; Emanuel H. Martin; Henrik Meilby; Felipe P. L. Melo; Daniel J. Metcalfe; Vincent P. Medjibe; Jean Paul Metzger; Jerome Millet; D. Mohandass; Juan C. Montero; Márcio de Morisso...; Badru Mugerwa; Hidetoshi Nagamasu; Reuben Nilus; Susana Ochoa-Gaona; Onrizal; Navendu Page; Pia Parolin; Marc Parren; Narayanaswamy Par...; Ekananda Paudel; Andrea Permana; Maria T. F. Piedade; Nigel C. A. Pitman; Lourens Poorter; Axel D. Poulsen; John Poulsen; Jennifer Powers; Rama C. Prasad; Jean-Philippe Puy...; Jean-Claude Razaf...; Jan Reitsma; João Roberto dos ...; Wilson Roberto Sp...; Hugo Romero-Saltos; Francesco Rovero; Andes Hamuraby Rozak; Kalle Ruokolainen; Ervan Rutishauser; Felipe Saiter; Philippe Saner; Braulio A. Santos; Fernanda Santos; Swapan K. Sarker; Manichanh Satdichanh; Christine B. Schmitt; Jochen Schöngart; Mark Schulze; Marcio S. Suganuma; Douglas Sheil; Eduardo da Silva ...; Plinio Sist; Tariq Stevart; Raman Sukumar; I.-Fang Sun; Terry Sunderland; H. S. Suresh; Eizi Suzuki; Marcelo Tabarelli; Jangwei Tang; Natália Targhetta; Ida Theilade; Duncan W. Thomas; Peguy Tchouto; Johanna Hurtado; Renato Valencia; Johan L. C. H. va...; Tran Van Do; Rodolfo Vasquez; Hans Verbeeck; Victor Adekunle; Simone A. Vieira; Campbell O. Webb; Timothy Whitfeld; Serge A. Wich; John Williams; Florian Wittmann; Hannsjoerg Wöll; Xiaobo Yang; C. Yves Adou Yao; Sandra L. Yap; Tsuyoshi Yoneda; Rakan A. Zahawi; Rahmad Zakaria; Runguo Zang; Rafael L. de Assis; Bruno Garcia Luize; Eduardo M. Ventic...
• Keywords: Tropical disease; Tree (set theory); Tropical climate

Significance People are fascinated by the amazing diversity of tropical forests and will be surprised to learn that robust estimates number tree species lacking. We show there at least 40,000, but possibly more than 53,000, in tropics, contrast only 124 across temperate Europe. Almost all restricted their respective continents, Indo-Pacific region appears as species-rich America, with each these two regions being almost five times rich African forests. Our study shows most extremely rare, meaning they may under serious risk extinction current deforestation rates.