The Royal Society’s scientific academy has elected climate scientist Carlos Nobre, one of the leading researchers studying the Amazon rainforest, as its first Brazilian member since Emperor Dom Pedro II joined the group in the 19th century.
Nobre has studied the Amazon for decades and was an early proponent of the theory that rapid deforestation is pushing the world’s largest rainforest to a tipping point after which the biome could dry up and turn into a savanna.
“The Royal Society is giving international recognition to the risks facing the Amazon,” Nobre told Reuters on Friday (13). “It is a huge risk that we will lose the greatest biodiversity and the largest tropical forest on the planet,” he added.
The preservation of the Amazon rainforest is vital to contain climate change because it absorbs a large amount of carbon dioxide.
Last year, Nobre led a group of about 200 researchers that released a historic report with the most detailed and complete analysis to date of scientific knowledge about the Amazon rainforest.
The Royal Society of Great Britain began in 1660 and is the oldest national scientific academy.
Nobel laureate Peter Medawar, a Brazilian-born British biologist, was also a former member, according to the Royal Society. But Medawar, who died in 1987, gave up his Brazilian citizenship as a teenager.
(Edited by David Gregorio)
Source: CNN Brasil
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