Anthropogenic disturbances jeopardize biodiversity conservation within tropical rainforest reserves

Significance Human activities disrupt ecosystem functioning and jeopardize biodiversity, especially in the tropics. Increasing evidence shows this disturbance is happening even within reserves, but the underlying causative mechanisms are unclear. This paper provides a unique long-term (four decades) empirical, experimental, and modeling study showing how cascading effects of human disturbances affect the structure, dynamics, and functioning of a tropical rainforest reserve. In particular, we provide evidence of how fragmentation and defaunation, operating in synergy, stimulated the population explosion of a long-lived understory palm that, in turn, was followed by reductions in biodiversity and changes in some ecosystem properties.