Microscale models and urban heat island studies: a systematic review.

Urban climate analysis usually uses data from weather stations, traverse, or satellite images. However, this methodology also has its limitations, since the series of data for climate monitoring can be scarce. Another option that has been earning attention in recent years is numeric models, which perform simulations in urban climate.

Preferred temperature in the warmth of cities: Body size, sex and development stage matter more than urban climate in a ground-dwelling spider.

Most ectotherms rely on behavioural thermoregulation to maintain body temperatures close to their physiological optimum. Hence, ectotherms can drastically limit their exposure to thermal extremes by selecting a narrower range of temperatures, which includes their preferred temperature (Tpref). Despite evidence that behavioural thermoregulation can be adjusted by phenotypic plasticity or constrained by natural selection, intraspecific Tpref variations across environmental gradients remain overlooked as compared to other thermal traits like thermal tolerance.

Low levels of shade and climate change adaptation of Arabica coffee in southeastern Brazil.

Coffee is one of the most consumed beverages in the world, and its international market has been growing for many years. Unfortunately, the Brazilian coffee production is threatened by high temperatures projected by climate change models. We evaluated three schemes of low levels of shade, which avoid the loss of production, as a strategy to adapt coffee to possible climate change.

The DURAMAZ indicator system: a cross-disciplinary comparative tool for assessing ecological and social changes in the Amazon.

During the last 20 years, the Amazon region has been at the same time a place of massive ecological and social change and a laboratory of experiments aimed at promoting sustainable development. Policies and project initiatives involving diverse social groups and environmental contexts have been implemented across the region. They have resulted in mixed outcomes and trade-offs between social and environmental dimensions, making their impact at the local level difficult to assess and their successes difficult to generalize.

Impact of land-cover change in the southern Amazonia climate: a case study for the region of Alta Floresta, Mato Grosso, Brazil.

The transformation of forest into pastures in the Brazilian Amazon leads to significant consequences to climate at local scale. In the region of Alta Floresta (Mato Grosso, Brazil), deforestation has been intense with over half the forests being cut since 1970. This article first examines the evolution of precipitation observed in this region and shows a significant trend in the decrease in total precipitation especially at the end of the dry season and at the beginning of the rainy season.