In a May 1972 study in central Alberta, 13 0.5 ha plots of semimature trembling aspen were burned experimentally under various conditions to provide new information on fire behaviour and impact, with particular regard to aspen ecosystems. Fire data were documented for all plots, particularly head fire rates of spread and frontal fire intensities. The following August an assessment was made of the impact of burning on aspen overstory mortality and understory vegetation response. In May 1978 two of the plots were jointly reburned. The August survey that followed assessed the effects of the reburning.

A discussion of the direct and indirect mechanisms by which fire and climate interact to influence carbon cycling in North American boreal forests. The first section summarizes the information needed to understand and manage fires' effects on the ecology of boreal forests and its influence on global climate change issues. Following chapters discuss in detail the role of fire in the ecology of boreal forests, present data sets on fire and the distribution of carbon, and treat the use of satellite imagery in monitoring these regions as well as approaches to modeling the relevant processes.

Global Biomass Burning provides a convenient and current reference on such topics as the remote sensing of biomass burning from space, the geographical distribution of burning; the combustion products of burning in tropical, temperate, and boreal ecosystems; burning as a global source of atmospheric gases and particulates; the impact of biomass burning gases and particulates on global climate; and the role of biomass burning on biodiversity and past global extinctions."--Pub. desc.