As an important proxy for investigating past fire activities, charcoal is often used to explore the characteristics of fire distribution and its relationships with vegetation, climate, and human activities. Research into the spatial distribution and environmental determinants for charcoal, however, is still limited. In this study, we identified and counted charcoal from topsoil samples covering the Tibetan Plateau using the pollen methodology, and investigated its relationships with vegetation net primary production (NPP), elevation, climate (precipitation, mean temperature of the coldest month and warmest month) and human population by boosted regression trees (BRT). Results reveal that the concentration of microscopic charcoal, macroscopic charcoal, and total charcoal all increase from south-west to north-east, which is consistent with the trend that the population density on the Tibetan Plateau is high in the east and low in the west, suggesting that an increase in human activity is likely to promote the occurrence of fire. The BRT modeling reveals that NPP, elevation, and mean temperature of the coldest month are important factors for total charcoal concentration on the Tibetan Plateau, and the frequency and intensity of fires further increase with increasing vegetation biomass, decreasing elevation, and decreasing mean temperature of the coldest month. The spatial variation characteristics of charcoal from topsoil on the Tibetan Plateau not only reflect well the spatial fire situation in the region, but also have a good indicative significance for vegetation, climate, and human activities.

木炭作为调查过去火灾活动的重要指标，常被用来探索火灾分布特征及其与植被、气候和人类活动的关系。然而，对木炭的空间分布和环境决定因素的研究仍然有限。在本研究中，我们利用花粉方法对青藏高原表土样本中的木炭进行了识别和计数，并研究了其与植被净初级生产力（NPP）、海拔、气候（降水量、最冷月和最热月平均气温）的关系。通过增强回归树（BRT）来计算人口和人口。结果表明，微观木炭、宏观木炭和总木炭浓度均由西南向东北增加，这与青藏高原人口密度东高西低的趋势一致。 ，表明人类活动的增加很可能促进火灾的发生。BRT模型显示，NPP、海拔和最冷月平均气温是青藏高原总木炭浓度的重要影响因素，随着植被生物量的增加、海拔的降低和青藏高原平均气温的降低，火灾发生的频率和强度进一步增加。最冷的月份。青藏高原表土木炭的空间变化特征不仅能很好地反映该地区的空间火灾状况，而且对植被、气候和人类活动具有良好的指示意义。