Self-organized criticality of forest fires in China

Self-organized criticality (SOC) of forest fires in China from 1950 to 1989 is studied. The stability, scale-invariant character of SOC and external effects on SOC of forest fires in China are analyzed in detail. Forest-fire cellular automata model is a typical model for the research of SOC. Based on the traditional forest-fire model, an improved model, in which effects of tree species, meteorological conditions and human efforts on forest fires are considered, is introduced. Actual forest fire data in China are compared with simulation results of the two models. It is shown that forest fire data In China have SOC behavior and simulation results of the improved model accord better with actual forest fire data than those of the traditional model.