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Termites can decompose more than half of deadwood in tropical rainforest

Griffiths HM 1 , Ashton LA 2 , Evans TA 3 , Parr CL 4 , Eggleton P 5

Affiliations 

  • 1 School of Environmental Sciences, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, L69 3GP, UK
  • 2 School of Biological Sciences, The University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, China; Department of Life Sciences, Natural History Museum, London, UK; Environmental Futures Research Institute, Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia. Electronic address: lashton@hku.hk
  • 3 Environmental Futures Research Institute, Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia
  • 4 School of Environmental Sciences, University of Liverpool, Liverpool, L69 3GP, UK; School of Biological Sciences, University of Western Australia, Perth, Australia; Department of Zoology and Entomology, University of Pretoria, Pretoria 0002, South Africa. School of Animal, Plant and Environmental Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Wits 2050, South Africa
  • 5 Department of Life Sciences, Natural History Museum, London, UK
Curr Biol, 2019 02 18;29(4):R118-R119.
PMID: 30779897 DOI: 10.1016/j.cub.2019.01.012

Abstract

Termite-mediated decomposition is an important, but often overlooked, component of the carbon cycle. Using a large-scale suppression experiment in Borneo, Griffiths et al. found that termites contribute between 58 and 64% of mass loss from dead wood.

* Title and MeSH Headings from MEDLINE®/PubMed®, a database of the U.S. National Library of Medicine.

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