Study
Rate of tree carbon accumulation increases continuously with tree size
Stephenson, N. L.; Das, A. J.; Condit, R.; Russo, S. E.; Baker, P. J.; Beckman, N. G.; Coomes, D. A.; Lines, E. R.; Morris, W. K.; Rüger, N.; Álvarez, E.; Blundo, C.; Bunyavejchewin, S.; Chuyong, G.; Davies, S. J.; Duque, Á.; Ewango, C. N.; Flores, O.; Franklin, J. F.; Grau, H. R.; Hao, Z.; Harmon, M. E.; Hubbell, S. P.; Kenfack, D.; Lin, Y.; Makana, J.-R.; Malizia, A.; Malizia, L. R.; Pabst, R. J.; Pongpattananurak, N.; Su, S.-H.; Sun, I.-F.; Tan, S.; Thomas, D.; van Mantgem, P. J.; Wang, X.; Wiser, S. K.; Zavala, M. A.
Nature, 2014
Repeat diameter measurements of hundreds of thousands of individually tagged trees were converted to mass, and the mass gained per tree per year was plotted against tree size for each species separately.
- Studied in
- Tracheophyta
- Sample size
- 673046 individual trees, across 403 species, measured repeatedlyRepeat measurements from tropical and temperate forest plots worldwide.
For the large majority of species examined, absolute mass growth kept rising with size. A big tree does not merely hold more carbon than a small one; it adds carbon faster, in some cases adding as much mass in a year as an entire small tree contains.
What it means
The authors' reading, and ours. Where they differ, that difference is the point.
How the authors put it
Large old trees are active, and often accelerating, carbon sinks at the level of the individual, contrary to the assumption that growth slows with age.
How NatureHQ reads it
This is the study that dismantles "old trees stop absorbing carbon", and it is worth being precise about what it does and does not overturn. Relative growth does slow: a big tree adds a smaller fraction of itself each year. Absolute growth is what matters for carbon, and that keeps rising, because the tree is adding a thin layer to an enormous surface. The individual-level result also does not automatically scale to the stand — an old forest has fewer, larger trees and more decomposition — which is a different question, answered by different work.
- Individual trees, not forests; stand-level carbon balance includes mortality and decay that this does not measure.
- Mass is estimated from diameter using allometric equations, which carry their own error, particularly for the largest trees.
- Species that do slow with size exist and are reported; the result is a strong majority, not a universal law.
Measuring the same 600,000 trees again
Do big old trees slow down, or do they add mass faster than young ones?
What this study is used for on NatureHQ
One study can inform several subjects. Here is everywhere this one is cited.
Published by: Nature PortfolioPublished in a Nature Portfolio journal.
This reference was resolved automatically against Crossref and OpenAlex on 2026-08-30.
NatureHQ summarises research in its own words and does not reproduce published text. Reviewed 2026-08-30.