Mangrove Forest Ecosystems: Present Status, Challenges, and Future Directions
A special issue of Forests (ISSN 1999-4907). This special issue belongs to the section "Forest Ecology and Management".
Deadline for manuscript submissions: 31 January 2026 | Viewed by 3113
Special Issue Editor
Interests: mangrove ecology; coastal biogeochemistry; energetics of tropical coastal ecosystems; marine environmental change; coastal ecology and biogeochemistry
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Special Issue Information
Dear Colleagues,
Mangroves constitute a globally significant forest ecosystem that exists between land and sea, with associated problems and advantages being inherent to both terrestrial and marine ecosystems. While mangroves have had a troubled past and continue to have an uncertain present and future, they are heavily used for a wide array of ecosystem goods and services. They remain heavily deforested for timber and are used in housing and other forms of construction. Moreover, they are utilized for charcoal, food, and medicine. Mangrove ecosystems offer coastal protection and provide cultural values to hundreds of millions of indigenous populations throughout the subtropics and tropics. At broader scales, mangroves are negatively affected by climate change, especially by the rising of sea levels and by extreme weather events. Most recently, the role of mangroves has been considered in climate change mitigation and adaptation as they are the most carbon-rich ecosystems on Earth, sequestering disproportionate amounts of atmospheric carbon dioxide into their sediments.
In this Special Issue, we are looking for papers dealing with present and future issues and perspectives with respect to mangrove forest science, conservation, and management. Topics include the current state of vital mangrove areas, means and modes of deforestation and degradation, blue carbon science, future projections (including modeling forecasts of mangrove forest area), new frontiers of science and management (such as advances in genomics and molecular biology), and conservation measures. We encourage studies from all fields, including experimental, theoretical, and numerical models; field and experimental studies; real case studies; and decision-making rules.
Dr. Daniel M. Alongi
Guest Editor
Manuscript Submission Information
Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.
Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Forests is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.
Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.
Keywords
- climate change
- conservation
- management
- blue carbon
- genomics and genetics
- deforestation and degradation
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