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Current policy is driving renewed impetus to restore forests to return ecological function, protect species, sequester carbon and secure livelihoods. Here we assess the contribution of tree planting to ecosystem restoration in tropical and sub-tropical Asia; we synthesize evidence on mortality and growth of planted trees at 176 sites and assess structural and biodiversity recovery of co-located actively restored and naturally regenerating forest plots. Mean mortality of planted trees was 18% 1 year after planting, increasing to 44% after 5 years. Mortality varied strongly by site and was typically ca 20% higher in open areas than degraded forest, with height at planting positively affecting survival. Size-standardized growth rates were negatively related to species-level wood density in degraded forest and plantations enrichment settings. Based on community-level data from 11 landscapes, active restoration resulted in faster accumulation of tree basal area and structural properties were closer to old-growth reference sites, relative to natural regeneration, but tree species richness did not differ. High variability in outcomes across sites indicates that planting for restoration is potentially rewarding but risky and context-dependent. Restoration projects must prepare for and manage commonly occurring challenges and align with efforts to protect and reconnect remaining forest areas.The abstract of this article is available in Bahasa Indonesia in the electronic supplementary material.This article is part of the theme issue 'Understanding forest landscape restoration: reinforcing scientific foundations for the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration'.

1. The stewardship of forests across multiple human generations has potential to lead to cultural innovations fostering sustainable uses. Nevertheless, positive culture-nature interactions are often disrupted due to colonial exploitation and a lack of intrinsic value ascribed to nature in capitalist economies. There is global recognition that restoring degraded ecosystems is critical to promote the welfare of people and nature by reducing the negative impacts of global climate change and diminishing biodiversity. However, with a focus on technical remedies, restoration and reforestation efforts generally fail to address the root causes of ecosystem degradation.2. In this perspective paper, we call for explicit incorporation of cultural values into global reforestation efforts. We focus on music as a cultural ecosystem service as music has been a prominent part of human history with clear sociological and psychological attributes that may invite mass interest and participation. We illustrate the value of musical linkages via three case studies from Europe, Africa and Hawaii focusing on native tree species, their wood, musical ecology and their interaction with culture.3. We show that multi-generational stewardship of native ecosystems in Europe has allowed the refinement of the violin to its current form, one that is culturally significant for millions of people and has created a multi-million dollar industry. This development stems from a 500-year tradition of craftsmanship handed down across generations and illustrates that ecocultural interactions can be a strong dynamo for development of unique commodities.4. In contrast, in regions where extirpation of native plant species was used as a deliberate colonization strategy, many ecocultural linkages face risk of extinction. Our case studies from Africa and Hawaii illustrate how native tree species of particular value for musical expression were nearly lost and along with loss of music, important cultural connections to nature.5. In the context of restoration, there is also evidence that music-based linkages can revitalize nature-culture interactions and promote restoration of native ecosystems. Incorporating native trees in global reforestation efforts is critical for ensuring that reforestation efforts capture the synergies needed for developing new ideologies that promote the well-being of co-dependent humans and all life.

Traditional clear-fell forestry greatly alters community structure and ecosystem function within boreal forests and alternative management practices may reduce these impacts. Continuous-cover forestry can maintain similar invertebrate and plant communities to unmanaged forest, but whether this extends to soil fungal communities remains unclear. Within four sites across the mid-boreal zone of Sweden, we conducted a comprehensive study to assess the impact of continuous-cover and clear-felling on soil fungi and chemical properties within Norway spruce dominated forests, using unmanaged forest as a control. We sampled soils for chemical properties (pH, carbon, nitrogen, C/N and Organic matter) and used both surveys of fungal fruiting bodies and state of the DNA metabarcoding techniques to assess treatment effects on soil fungal communities. We found that forest management practices had significant effects soil pH, C and C/N ratio and that continuous-cover forestry had more similar soil properties to unmanaged forest. Furthermore, the biodiversity of fruiting bodies, as expressed by species richness and Shannon's diversity index, was higher in continuous-cover forestry and unmanaged forest compared to clear-felled areas. However, the opposite was true for the diversity of soil fungal communities, which was probably due to the high level of disturbance in clear-felled areas, and thus, ample habitat for early successional colonisers and some remnants of mature forest communities. However, in agreement with predictions we found that the composition of both fruiting body and soil fungal communities broadly similar in continuous-cover and unmanaged forest, but fundamentally different to clear-felled areas. Consequently, our findings highlight that continuous-cover forestry is an alternative to conventional practise, maintaining communities associated with unmanaged forest and mimicking natural disturbance regimes.

Bakgrund:Ländryggssmärta är en vanlig orsak till nedsatt funktionsförmåga och 60–80% av alla vuxna har upplevt smärta i ländryggen någon gång i livet. Fysisk aktivitet (FA) har god evidens att förhindra att ländryggssmärtan utvecklas till kronisk samt för att minska smärta och öka/bibehålla funktion. Fysioterapeutstudenter inhämtar under utbildningen kunskap om betydelsen av FA i både prevention och behandling, men lever vi som vi lär? Syfte:Att undersöka förekomst av ländryggssmärta, genomsnittlig mängd FA samt skillnader gällande mängd och intensitet av FA hos fysioterapeutstudenter i Sverige med respektive utan ländryggssmärta. Studien har även undersökt könsskillnader avseende prevalens av ländryggssmärta. Metod:En tvärsnittsstudie av kvantitativ, komperativ och icke-experimentell design. En webbenkät skickades till samtliga fysioterapeutprogram i Sverige. Totalt deltog 252 personer av uppskattningsvis 1700 studerande. De svarande fick fylla i bakgrundsdata samt för de senaste sju dagarna skatta sin upplevda ländryggssmärta enligt 1–10 på Numeric Rating Scale (NRS) och sin mängd FA på olika intensiteter enligt International Physical Activity Questionnaire Short Form (IPAQ-SF). Resultat: Prevalensen av ländryggssmärta var 60% och förekomsten var lika mellan könen (män: 58%, kvinnor: 60%). Majoriteten av deltagarnas aktivitetsmängd klassificeras som hög. Resultaten påvisade ingen skillnad i FA mellan grupperna gällande total, mycket ansträngande samt måttligt ansträngande FA. Konklusion:Inga statistiska skillnader gällande prevalens av ländryggssmärta kunde ses mellan könen. Studien påvisade ingen signifikant skillnad mellan grupperna med respektive utan ländryggsmärta gällande mängd eller intensitet av FA. Vidare forskning behövs på ämnet. Background:Low back pain (LBP) is a common cause of disability and 60-80% of adults have experienced LBP at some point in their lives. Physical activity (PA) has good evidence to prevent LBP from becoming chronic, reduce pain and increase function. Physical therapy students learn of the importance of PA in both prevention and treatment. But do we live as we learn? Objective:To investigate the prevalence of LBP, average amount of PA and differences regarding the amount and intensity of PA amongst physical therapy students with and without LBP in Sweden. The study has also examined gender differences in the prevalence of LBP. Method:A cross-sectional study with quantitative, comparative and non-experimental design. A web survey was distributed to all physiotherapy programs in Sweden. Out of an estimated 1,700 students, 252 responded. Respondents submitted background information and estimated for the last seven days their LBP from 1-10 according to Numeric Rating Scale (NRS) and their amount of PA at different intensities according to International Physical Activity Questionnaire Short Form (IPAQ-SF). Results:The prevalence of LBP was 60%. 58% of men and 60% of women estimated LBP in the last seven days. The majority of the participants’ PA was classified as high. The results showed no significant difference in PA between the groups. Conclusion:No statistic differences regarding prevalence of LBP could be seen between the sexes. No significant difference regarding amount or intensity of PA was found between the groups with and without LBP. Further research is needed.

Understanding historic development of multi-layered Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.) stands and how they became multi-layered is essential for assessing the feasibility of using the selection system in these stands. To address this we measured trees (dbh ≥ 4 cm) and saplings (height > 0.5 m dbh < 4 cm) and used increment cores from 244 sample trees to reconstruct stand structure development, ingrowth and basal area increment in four multi-layered Scots pine stands in Sweden. Age distributions were quite homogeneous, three of the four stands had age distributions that were dominated by one or two 20 year age classes, suggesting that the irregular diameter distributions displayed in 2013 had developed from more homogeneous distributions. Analyses of the historical ingrowth of Scots pine into the tree layer suggested that the multi-layered structure was created by mass regeneration followed by size stratification caused by differences in growth rates within even-aged cohorts of regeneration. Large reductions of the basal area in the past resulted in abundant regeneration and ingrowth of Scots pine. When the over-story increased in basal area over time, there was a growth differentiation among the saplings and small trees, gradually creating a multi-layered stand structure as some of the trees grew into the larger size classes while others remained in the smaller size classes. When the stands reached a basal area of about 13 m2 ha−1 the ingrowth of saplings past 1.3 m height essentially stopped but the size stratification among the small trees continued, further enhancing the multi-layered structure. The results indicate that to receive regeneration pulses and sustain a multi-layered structure in Scots pine forests, the basal area needs to be significantly reduced. The growth consequences of this need to be studied.

To achieve sustainability both ecological and production aspects need to be considered in forest management. Chequered gap shelter wood system (CGSS), consist of small clear-felled gaps with alternating areas of trees, giving the forest a chessboard appearance which potentially could combine the advantages from both the clear-cut system and continuous cover forestry. This approach will introduce more edges which might influence the effect of wind, temperature and solar radiation on seedlings and trees. In this study we evaluate 1) the influence of the forest edge and 2) the north- and south facing part in the gaps on the growth of seedlings and trees (Pinus sylvestris and Picea abies) in gaps and shelter forests, respectively, and compare the growth with that in a conventional clearcutting system. Overall, edges effected seedling growth negatively and tree growth positively. Seedlings also grew better at the northern sun exposed parts compared to the southern shaded parts of the gaps. As a consequence of these edge effects seedlings had a lower, and shelter trees a higher, growth in the CGS-system compared to the reference areas. Seedlings in the central part of the gaps grew better than seedlings in the reference area. Norwegian spruce seems to be the most suited tree species for this silvicultural approach. Given the contrasting effect of edges on seedlings and trees the production over the whole rotation need to be evaluated in future studies.

Uncertainties of realized benefits and the potential for environmental effects of genetically modified (GM) trees may comprise an obstacle for an environmentally safe deployment and social acceptance of such products. Through a series of studies I explored target and non-target effects of GM trees in an objective to increase our knowledge of both benefits and environmental effects of these products. In these studies I used two Populus hybrid lines, modified for altered lignin synthesis and Bacillus thuringiensis mediated insect resistance against Coleopteran insects. The studies range from bioassays and controlled microcosm studies in the greenhouse to studies using potted plants in the field and studies designed to address environmental effects of leaf litter from GM trees on aquatic ecosystems. Results show a strong support of realized benefits in terms of resistance effectiveness of the insect resistant trees. Damage levels of relevant herbivorous insects were reduced both in the greenhouse and in the field. However, it is also indicated that benefits in term of growth may be conditionally determined and depend on environmental context, herbivore loads and interactions with non-target herbivores. In this respect, unexpected changes in innate resistance as shown here may be of importance for realized benefits. It is further shown how leaf litter from GM trees may cause effects that cross ecosystem boundaries. For example, lignin modification affected leaf litter quality and the decomposition of litter from one lignin modified line was significantly decreased. Further, leaf litter from insect resistant trees did not affect litter quality but did cause significant changes in the community composition of insects colonizing the litter. Given the signs of environmental control over realized benefits I believe that the field performance of these products needs further confirmation. Studies designed to target different aspects of environmental variability that may occur throughout the lifetime of a trees may be needed for a proper judgment of realized benefits. In such assessments effects on non-target organisms and environments need to be considered and the cause of environmental effects explained. Eventually assessments of GM trees need to relate costs and risks of these products to the costs associated with alternative management measures.