Two-thirds of the Earth's biodiversity is found in the tropics, which ecosystems play a critical role in global carbon sequestration, energy cycles, and human well-being. Yet, extensive human land conversion jeopardizes much of its biodiversity, forcing species to inhabit fragmented landscapes composed of habitat remnants surrounded by human land covers such as crops, pastures, or urban areas. These emerging environments pose multiple and simultaneous threats to tropical species in both, unprotected and protected areas, including habitat destruction, logging, fires, road expansion, or biological invasions, and causing not only species losses but also affecting a myriad of ecological processes that are critical for tropical ecosystems recovery. Unfortunately, many of these threats still remain poorly understood or under debate, limiting our ability to develop effective conservation strategies to mitigate their impact and design biodiversity-friendly human-modified landscapes.

This symposium will bring together researchers studying the most significant threats and predictors of biodiversity loss in human-modified landscapes across the tropic’s world, including studies at different scales, from global, regional (in regions such as Mexico), to landscapes as well as simulation studies. Talks will (1) cover diverse taxonomic groups and biomes, including studies on plants (from seedlings to adult trees), mammals (primates and other arboreal mammal communities), birds and the entire species assemblages, in both wet and dry tropical environments; (2) assess key predictors of taxonomic and functional diversities, as well as species extinction risk; (3) incorporate different disciplines, including landscape ecology, macroecology, and conservation biology and (4) include different methodologies, such as global meta-analysis, a novel Bayesian spatio-phylogenetic approach or trait and individual-based spatially explicit modeling. These talks will be important for further discussions to guide urgently needed conservation and restoration strategies aimed at mitigating the impact of human disturbances on tropical biodiversity loss. This session also aims to identify critical knowledge gaps and future research directions that can enhance biodiversity conservation efforts in tropical areas.