TY - JOUR
T1 - How Landscape Ecology Informs Global Land-Change Science and Policy
AU - Mayer, Audrey L.
AU - Buma, Brian
AU - Davis, Amcrossed Dsignlie
AU - GagnCrossed D Sign, Sara A.
AU - Louise Loudermilk, E.
AU - Scheller, Robert M.
AU - Schmiegelow, Fiona K A
AU - Wiersma, Yolanda F.
AU - Franklin, Janet
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2016 Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of American Institute of Biological Sciences 2016. This work is written by (a) US Government employee(s) and is in the public domain in the US.
PY - 2016/6/1
Y1 - 2016/6/1
N2 - Landscape ecology is a discipline that explicitly considers the influence of time and space on the environmental patterns we observe and the processes that create them. Although many of the topics studied in landscape ecology have public policy implications, three are of particular concern: climate change; land use-land cover change (LULCC); and a particular type of LULCC, urbanization. These processes are interrelated, because LULCC is driven by both human activities (e.g., agricultural expansion and urban sprawl) and climate change (e.g., desertification). Climate change, in turn, will affect the way humans use landscapes. Interactions among these drivers of ecosystem change can have destabilizing and accelerating feedback, with consequences for human societies from local to global scales. These challenges require landscape ecologists to engage policymakers and practitioners in seeking long-Term solutions, informed by an understanding of opportunities to mitigate the impacts of anthropogenic drivers on ecosystems and adapt to new ecological realities.
AB - Landscape ecology is a discipline that explicitly considers the influence of time and space on the environmental patterns we observe and the processes that create them. Although many of the topics studied in landscape ecology have public policy implications, three are of particular concern: climate change; land use-land cover change (LULCC); and a particular type of LULCC, urbanization. These processes are interrelated, because LULCC is driven by both human activities (e.g., agricultural expansion and urban sprawl) and climate change (e.g., desertification). Climate change, in turn, will affect the way humans use landscapes. Interactions among these drivers of ecosystem change can have destabilizing and accelerating feedback, with consequences for human societies from local to global scales. These challenges require landscape ecologists to engage policymakers and practitioners in seeking long-Term solutions, informed by an understanding of opportunities to mitigate the impacts of anthropogenic drivers on ecosystems and adapt to new ecological realities.
KW - climate change
KW - land use
KW - landscape ecology
KW - policy
KW - urbanization
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U2 - 10.1093/biosci/biw035
DO - 10.1093/biosci/biw035
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:84975684632
SN - 0006-3568
VL - 66
SP - 458
EP - 469
JO - BioScience
JF - BioScience
IS - 6
ER -