Carlos A. Nobre

University of Sao Paulo


Primary Section: 63, Environmental Sciences and Ecology
Membership Type:
International Member (elected 2015)

Biosketch

Carlos A. Nobre is an Earth System scientist from Brazil. He graduated in Electronics Engineering from the Aeronautics Institute of Technology (ITA), Brazil, in 1974 and obtained a PhD in Meteorology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), USA, in 1983. He dedicated his scientific carrier mostly to Amazonian and climate science at Brazil’s National Institutes of Amazonian Research (INPA) and Space Research (INPE). He proposed almost 30 years ago the hypothesis of Amazon ‘savannization’ in response to deforestation. He was Program Scientist of the Large-Scale Biosphere-Atmosphere Experiment in Amazonia (LBA). He is a former National Secretary of R&D of Ministry of Science and Technology of Brazil and former President of the Federal Agency for Post-Graduate Education (CAPES). He is foreign member of the US National Academy of Sciences, member of the Brazilian Academy of Science and of the World Academy of Science. He was one of the authors of IPCC AR4 awarded with the Nobel Peace Prize in 2007. He is presently a senior researcher with the Institute for Advanced Studies, University of São Paulo and the creator of the Amazon Third Way-Amazonia 4.0 Initiative that seeks a new development paradigm based on a biodiversity-driven bio-economy utilizing modern technologies of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

Research Interests

On one hand, he continues to do research on the risks of a tipping point of the Amazon forest driven by anthropogenic factor such as global warming, regional deforestation and forest fires. Many observations show that the Amazon is very near a tipping point of savannization of more than 50% of the rainforest. On the other hand, he is also working on the solution space. He started the Amazon Third Way Initiative and the Project Amazonia 4.0 to develop a "standing forest-flowing rivers" innovative bio-economy for the Amazon, based on adding value to the forest products harnessing its immense biological and biomimetic assets.

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