Lessons from arid Kutch: Global warming threat to evergreen forests

Tropical rainforests, considered the lungs of the Earth for their capacity to work as major carbon cleansers, are under threat.

- Godhooli Sharma

LUCKNOW: Tropical rainforests, considered the lungs of the Earth for their capacity to work as major carbon cleansers, are under threat.

A recent study by scientists at Birbal Sahni Institute of Palaeosciences (BSIP) has indicated the possibilities of ecological changes due to global warming.

They have studied around 40-million-year-old sedimentary rock layers of the Kutch Basin to find how the warming during Middle Eocene Climate Optimum (MECO) led to disturbances in tropical/evergreen rainforests which they say once existed in the region.

Poonam Verma, a scientist involved in the research, said that the Kutch Basin resembles a book, with layers revealing information about different biota from various time periods.