The pulse of life with the seasons is a classic theme of biology, equally cap turing every man's curiosity about early and late milestones of every year's cycle and the critical physiologist's inquiry into life's subtle signals and responses. Natural historians of ancient and renaissance time as well as today have charted the commonsense facts behind inspired traditions of poetry and practical rules for growing food and fiber. This volume brings together several ways of organizing the basic principles of phenology. These find order in the otherwise overwhelming mass of detail that captures our fleeting attention, like the daily newspaper, and then tends to fade into the overstuffed archives of history. Is this order so obvious and understandable that there is no longer any scien tific challenge to "phenology" as a tradition? Or does apparent simplicity mask a complex and ultimately baffling obstacle to the understanding of seasonality in even those few indicator plants and animals we know best, not to men tion the less known species or races making up the rest of each major land scape unit or ecosystem? Denying both these hasty opinions, we think that this volume well illustrates a range of questions and answers-from soundly established (but not trivial) doctrine to exciting inquiry about how ecosystems are organized.
Phenology is the study of plant and animal life cycle events, which are triggered by environmental changes, especially temperature. Wide ranges of phenomena are included, from first openings of leaf and flower buds, to insect hatchings and return of birds. Each one gives a ready measure of the environment as viewed by the associated organism. Thus, phenological events are ideal indicators of the impact of local and global changes in weather and climate on the earth's biosphere. Assessing our changing world is a complex task that requires close cooperation from experts in biology, climatology, ecology, geography, oceanography, remote sensing and other areas. This book is a synthesis of current phenological knowledge, designed as a primer on the field for global change and general scientists, students and interested members of the public. With contributions from a diverse group of over fifty phenological experts, covering data collection, current research, methods and applications, it demonstrates the accomplishments and potential of phenology as an integrative environmental science.
As climate change continues to dominate the international environmental agenda, phenology – the study of the timing of recurring biological events – has received increasing research attention, leading to an emerging consensus that phenology can be viewed as an ‘early warning system’ for climate change impact. A multidisciplinary science involving many branches of ecology, geography and remote sensing, phenology to date has lacked a coherent methodological text. This new synthesis, including contributions from many of the world’s leading phenologists, therefore fills a critical gap in the current biological literature. Providing critiques of current methods, as well as detailing novel and emerging methodologies, the book, with its extensive suite of references, provides readers with an understanding of both the theoretical basis and the potential applications required to adopt and adapt new analytical and design methods. An invaluable source book for researchers and students in ecology and climate change science, the book also provides a useful reference for practitioners in a range of sectors, including human health, fisheries, forestry, agriculture and natural resource management.
Terrestrial carbon balance is uncertain at the regional and global scale. A significant source of variability in mid-latitude ecosystems is related to the timing and duration of phenological phases. Spring phenology, in particular, has disproportionate effects on the annual carbon balance. However, the traditional phenological indices that are based on leaf-out and flowering times of select indicator species are not universally amenable for predicting the temporal dynamics of ecosystem carbon and water exchange. Phenology of Ecosystem Processes evaluates current applications of traditional phenology in carbon and H2O cycle research, as well as the potential to identify phenological signals in ecosystem processes themselves. The book summarizes recent progress in the understanding of the seasonal dynamics of ecosystem carbon and H2O fluxes, the novel use of various methods (stable isotopes, time-series, forward and inverse modeling), and the implications for remote sensing and global carbon cycle modeling. Each chapter includes a literature review, in order to present the state-of-the-science in the field and enhance the book’s usability as an educational aid, as well as a case study to exemplify the use and applicability of various methods. Chapters that apply a specific methodology summarize the successes and challenges of particular methods for quantifying the seasonal changes in ecosystem carbon, water and energy fluxes. The book will benefit global change researchers, modelers, and advanced students.
Winner of the 2013 DeGroot Prize. A state-of-the-art presentation of spatio-temporal processes, bridging classic ideas with modern hierarchical statistical modeling concepts and the latest computational methods Noel Cressie and Christopher K. Wikle, are also winners of the 2011 PROSE Award in the Mathematics category, for the book “Statistics for Spatio-Temporal Data” (2011), published by John Wiley and Sons. (The PROSE awards, for Professional and Scholarly Excellence, are given by the Association of American Publishers, the national trade association of the US book publishing industry.) Statistics for Spatio-Temporal Data has now been reprinted with small corrections to the text and the bibliography. The overall content and pagination of the new printing remains the same; the difference comes in the form of corrections to typographical errors, editing of incomplete and missing references, and some updated spatio-temporal interpretations. From understanding environmental processes and climate trends to developing new technologies for mapping public-health data and the spread of invasive-species, there is a high demand for statistical analyses of data that take spatial, temporal, and spatio-temporal information into account. Statistics for Spatio-Temporal Data presents a systematic approach to key quantitative techniques that incorporate the latest advances in statistical computing as well as hierarchical, particularly Bayesian, statistical modeling, with an emphasis on dynamical spatio-temporal models. Cressie and Wikle supply a unique presentation that incorporates ideas from the areas of time series and spatial statistics as well as stochastic processes. Beginning with separate treatments of temporal data and spatial data, the book combines these concepts to discuss spatio-temporal statistical methods for understanding complex processes. Topics of coverage include: Exploratory methods for spatio-temporal data, including visualization, spectral analysis, empirical orthogonal function analysis, and LISAs Spatio-temporal covariance functions, spatio-temporal kriging, and time series of spatial processes Development of hierarchical dynamical spatio-temporal models (DSTMs), with discussion of linear and nonlinear DSTMs and computational algorithms for their implementation Quantifying and exploring spatio-temporal variability in scientific applications, including case studies based on real-world environmental data Throughout the book, interesting applications demonstrate the relevance of the presented concepts. Vivid, full-color graphics emphasize the visual nature of the topic, and a related FTP site contains supplementary material. Statistics for Spatio-Temporal Data is an excellent book for a graduate-level course on spatio-temporal statistics. It is also a valuable reference for researchers and practitioners in the fields of applied mathematics, engineering, and the environmental and health sciences.
Leading authors review the state-of-the-art in their field of investigation, and provide their views and perspectives for future research Chapters are extensively referenced to provide readers with a comprehensive list of resources on the topics covered All chapters include comprehensive background information and are written in a clear form that is also accessible to the non-specialist Leading authors review the state-of-the-art in their field of investigation, and provide their views and perspectives for future research Chapters are extensively referenced to provide readers with a comprehensive list of resources on the topics covered All chapters include comprehensive background information and are written in a clear form that is also accessible to the non-specialist
Can we unlock resilience to climate stress by better understanding linkages between the environment and biological systems? Agroclimatology allows us to explore how different processes determine plant response to climate and how climate drives the distribution of crops and their productivity. Editors Jerry L. Hatfield, Mannava V.K. Sivakumar, and John H. Prueger have taken a comprehensive view of agroclimatology to assist and challenge researchers in this important area of study. Major themes include: principles of energy exchange and climatology, understanding climate change and agriculture, linkages of specific biological systems to climatology, the context of pests and diseases, methods of agroclimatology, and the application of agroclimatic principles to problem-solving in agriculture.
The current eBook collection includes substantial scientific work in describing how insect species are responding to abiotic factors and recent climatic trends on the basis of insect physiology and population dynamics. The contributions can be broadly split into four chapters: the first chapter focuses on the function of environmental and mostly temperature driven models, to identify the seasonal emergence and population dynamics of insects, including some important pests. The second chapter provides additional examples on how such models can be used to simulate the effect of climate change on insect phenology and population dynamics. The third chapter focuses on describing the effects of nutrition, gene expression and phototaxis in relation to insect demography, growth and development, whilst the fourth chapter provides a short description on the functioning of circadian systems as well as on the evolutionary dynamics of circadian clocks.
Zweifelsohne das Referenzwerk zu diesem weitgefächerten und dynamischen Fachgebiet. The International Encyclopedia of Geograph ist das Ergebnis einer einmaligen Zusammenarbeit zwischen Wiley und der American Association of Geographers (AAG), beleuchtet und definiert Konzepte, Forschung und Techniken in der Geographie und zugehörigen Fachgebieten. Die Enzyklopädie ist als Online-Ausgabe und 15-bändige farbige Printversion erhältlich. Unter der Mitarbeit einer Gruppe von Experten aus aller Welt ist ein umfassender und fundierter Überblick über die Geographie in allen Erdteilen entstanden. - Enthält mehr als 1.000 Einträge zwischen 1.000 und 10.000 Wörtern, die verständlich in grundlegende Konzepte einführen, komplexe Themen erläutern und Informationen zu geographischen Gesellschaften aus aller Welt enthalten. - Entstanden unter der Mitarbeit von mehr als 900 Wissenschaftlern aus über 40 Ländern und bietet damit einen umfassenden und fundierten Überblick über die Geographie in allen Erdteilen. - Deckt das Fachgebiet umfassend ab und berücksichtigt auch die Richtungen Humangeographie, Physikalische Geographie, geographische Informationswissenschaften und -systeme, Erdwissenschaften und Umweltwissenschaften. - Führt interdisziplinäre Sichtweisen zu geographischen Themen und Verfahren zusammen, die auch für die Sozialwissenschaften, Geisteswissenschaften, Naturwissenschaften und Medizin von Interesse sind. - Printausgabe durchgängig in Farbe mit über 1.000 Illustrationen und Fotos. - Online-Ausgabe wird jährlich aktualisiert.
Ecological Modeling: An Introduction to the Art and Science of Modeling Ecological Systems, Volume 31, presents the skills needed to appropriately evaluate and use ecological models. Illustrated throughout with practical examples, the book discusses ecological modeling as both an art and a science, balancing the qualitative (artistic) side, with its foundations in common sense and modeling practice, against the quantitative (scientific) aspects of the modeling process. This book draws on the authors’ extensive experience in both teaching and using these techniques to provide readers with a practical, user-friendly guide that supports and encourages the appropriate, effective use of these tools. Provides readers with a commonsense understanding of the systems perspective and its foundations in general system theory Highlights the importance of a solid understanding of the qualitative aspects of the modeling process Facilitates the ability to appropriately evaluate and use ecological models Supports learning with a variety of simple examples to instill the desire and confidence to embark upon the modeling experience
