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Elsevier

Books in Ecosystems communities and organisms

  • Coral Reefs

    Their Complexity, Fragility and Future
    • 1st Edition
    • Robert Steneck
    • English
    Coral Reefs: Their Complexity, Fragility and Future offers an introduction to tropical coral reef ecosystems. It explores the combined geological, physical, chemical, and biological factors that make coral reefs among the most diverse and productive systems in the world. To unpack these complex systems, this book outlines the major players that create coral reefs, reconsiders how environmental and human forces shape reefs in the Anthropocene and identifies best practices for sustainable tourism and management of reef systems. Written by a leading expert of tropical reef systems, this book covers the biology, taxonomy, and ecological interactions of dominant reef organisms. Chapters systematically discuss the diversity of corals and the reef communities that they support, the key geological and biological factors driving their development, and critical processes of primary productivity, competition, predation, and herbivory. The book ends with a look to the future of coral reefs considering global change in the Anthropocene.Coral Reefs: Their Complexity, Fragility and Future combines fundamental concepts with novel research advances to explore the forces that shape coral reefs and predict the future of these ecosystems in the coming century. In discussing both the successes and failures of modern conservation efforts, this book offers a roadmap to guide stakeholders and industry leaders in developing policies surrounding the sustainable visitation and conservation of coral reef ecosystems. It is an indispensable resource for the next generation of marine scientists, conservationists, and policymakers concerned with the future of these critical ecosystems.

  • Mountain Diversity

    Dynamics of High‑Altitude Environments
    • 1st Edition
    • Robert Marchant
    • English
    Mountain Diversity: Dynamics of High‑Altitude Environments explores the highly biodiverse, culturally rich, and often threatened mountain regions that comprise a quarter of the world's continental land surface. These complex areas play a fundamental role in shaping continental-scale climates and have long been recognized as globally important centers of biodiversity. Mountains cover only 25% of global continental land surface yet are home to more than 85% of the world’s amphibians, birds, and mammals, many of which are entirely restricted to mountains. Despite their importance as stores of biodiversity and drivers of global sustainability, high altitude areas are particularly vulnerable to climate change and human interventions.Writte... by a leading expert in tropical mountain ecology, this book explores the processes that define the world's high-altitude areas in an easily digestible manner. Early chapters characterize high-altitude areas according to topography, fire regime, and climate. Dr. Marchant collates palaeoecological, archaeological, and historical insights to synthesize the intersection between mountain societies, ecosystems, and climate. Middle chapters examine the relationship between mountain climates and insect, bird, and mammalian biodiversity. Final chapters describe the future of land use, climate, and biodiversity, and explore opportunities to combine insights from different disciplines to enable pathways for more sustainable futures in sustainable mountain development.High-alt... regions are not adequately protected, and many mountain ranges remain completely unprotected. The status of these important storehouses of biodiversity is under increasing threat via population growth, climatic extremes, and land use change. High-Altitude Biodiversity will present current biodiversity across the world's mountains and use this information to identify priorities for new ways to understand, value, protect, and conserve high altitude areas. By taking a novel interdisciplinary approach that combines temporally and spatially diverse datasets from high altitude areas around the world, this can be used to inform future development.

  • Water Security for Ecosystems

    Metrics and Pathways for a Sustainable Future
    • 1st Edition
    • Amit Kumar + 3 more
    • English
    Water Security for Ecosystems: Metrics and Pathways for a Sustainable Future explores the mechanisms to support sustainable management of aquatic resources during rising global water demand, global change, and population growth. By identifying resource consumption indicators such as fishing load capacity and virtual water trade, it sets a clear framework for assessing the ecological footprint of extractive industries. It then proposes pathways to establish largescale water security via integrated aquatic resource management, water-efficient technologies, and sustainable policy intervention. Throughout, the book acknowledges the increased strain placed on global aquatic ecosystems due to unsustainable water use, extractive fisheries, agricultural practices, and more. Written by a renowned team of water resource managers, early chapters in this book define ecological footprints and explore the global policies, industries, and climate forces driving water insecurity. Central chapters explore novel and innovative water conservation techniques, advances in water resource management, and emerging technologies for sustainable water use. Final chapters explore global water policies and the role of international cooperation and propose a roadmap for minimizing aquatic ecological footprints.

  • Mangrove Ecosystem Dynamics

    • 1st Edition
    • Daniel M Alongi
    • English
    Mangrove Ecosystem Dynamics presents a comprehensive account of the various functions of mangrove habitats, from spatial dynamics of intertidal ecosystems to nutrient and biogeochemical cycling in sediments, tidal and coastal waters, and dependent species. This process-oriented approach is necessary to further understand the role of these dynamic habitats in the coastal ocean, and as a next step towards developing adequate strategies for mangrove conservation, management, and sustainable use.Written by a leading expert in mangrove biology and tropical marine ecology, this book takes an energetics approach to summarize the latest developments and knowledge in the field of mangrove ecology. Initial chapters discuss the fundamentals of intertidal environments and the spatial and temporal dynamics of mangrove habitats. Latter chapters address recent advances in food web energetics in tidal waters, exploring benthic invertebrate, planktonic, fish, and arboreal food webs. Final sections detail decomposition of organic matter, nutrient cycling, and carbon sequestration.Mangro... Ecosystem Dynamics addresses rapidly emerging and vital issues of climate change, blue carbon, sustainable management and restoration, and the connectivity and interdependence between mangroves and other coastal habitats and species. This new work offers a comprehensive functional view of the current and future state of mangrove ecosystems that will greatly benefit coastal and marine biologists, resource managers, conservationists, and students alike.

  • Applied Hierarchical Modeling in Ecology: Analysis of Distribution, Abundance and Species Richness in R and BUGS

    Volume 2: Dynamic and Advanced Models
    • 1st Edition
    • Marc Kéry + 1 more
    • English
    Applied Hierarchical Modeling in Ecology: Analysis of Distribution, Abundance and Species Richness in R and BUGS, Volume Two: Dynamic and Advanced Models provides a synthesis of the state-of-the-art in hierarchical models for plant and animal distribution, also focusing on the complex and more advanced models currently available. The book explains all procedures in the context of hierarchical models that represent a unified approach to ecological research, thus taking the reader from design, through data collection, and into analyses using a very powerful way of synthesizing data.

  • Freshwater Ecology

    Concepts and Environmental Applications of Limnology
    • 3rd Edition
    • Walter K. Dodds + 1 more
    • English
    Freshwater Ecology, Third Edition, covers everything from the basic chemical and physical properties of water, to the advanced and unifying concepts of community ecology and ecosystem relationships found in continental waters. Giving students a solid foundation for both courses and future fieldwork, and updated to include key issues, including how to balance ecological and human health needs, GMOs, molecular tools, fracking, and a host of other environmental issues, this book is an ideal resource for both students and practitioners in ecology and related fields.

  • Thorp and Covich's Freshwater Invertebrates

    Volume 3: Keys to Neotropical Hexapoda
    • 4th Edition
    • Neusa Hamada + 2 more
    • English
    Thorp and Covich’s Freshwater Invertebrates, Fourth Edition: Keys to Neotropical Hexapoda, Volume Three, provides a guide for identifying and evaluating a key subphylum, hexapoda, for Central America, South America and the Antarctic. This book is essential for anyone working in water quality management, conservation, ecology or related fields in this region, and is developed to be the most modern and consistent set of taxonomic keys available. It is part of a series that is designed to provide a highly comprehensive, current set of keys for a given bioregion, with all keys written in a consistent style. This series can be used for a full spectrum of interested readers, from students, to university professors and government agencies.

  • Networks of Invasion: A Synthesis of Concepts

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 56
    • English
    Networks of Invasion bridges a conceptual gap between ecological network studies and invasion biology studies. This book contains chapters detailing pressing concerns regarding invasive species in food webs, but also extends the idea of networks of invasion to other systems, such as mutualistic networks or even the human microbiome. Chapters describe the tools, models, and empirical methods adapted for tackling invasions in ecological networks.

  • Animal Vigilance

    Monitoring Predators and Competitors
    • 1st Edition
    • Guy Beauchamp
    • English
    Animal Vigilance builds on the author’s previous publication with Academic Press (Social Predation: How Group Living Benefits Predators and Prey) by developing several other themes including the development and mechanisms underlying vigilance, as well as developing more fully the evolution and function of vigilance. Animal vigilance has been at the forefront of research on animal behavior for many years, but no comprehensive review of this topic has existed. Students of animal behavior have focused on many aspects of animal vigilance, from models of its adaptive value to empirical research in the laboratory and in the field. The vast literature on vigilance is widely dispersed with often little contact between models and empirical work and between researchers focusing on different taxa such as birds and mammals. Animal Vigilance fills this gap in the available material.

  • Ecological Networks in an Agricultural World

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 49
    • English
    The theme of this volume is to discuss the Ecological Networks in an Agricultural World. The volume covers important topics such Networking Agroecology, Construction and Validation of Food-webs using Logic-based Machine Learning and Text-mining and Eco-evolutionary dynamics in agricultural networks.

  • Ecosystem Services

    Global Issues, Local Practices
    • 1st Edition
    • Sander Jacobs + 2 more
    • English
    Ecosystem Services: Global Issues, Local Practices covers scientific input, socioeconomic considerations, and governance issues on ecosystem services. This book provides hands-on transdisciplinary reflections by administrators and sector representatives involved in the ecosystem service community. Ecosystem Services develops shared approaches and scientific methods to achieve knowledge-based sustainable planning and management of ecosystem services. Professionals engaged in ecosystem service implementation have two options: de-emphasize the ecological and socioeconomic complexity and advance in the theoretical, abstract field, or try to develop research that is policy relevant and inclusive in an uncertain environment. This book provides a wide overview of issues at stake, of interest for any professional wishing to develop a broader view on ecosystem service science and practice.

  • Fundamentals of Ecosystem Science

    • 1st Edition
    • Kathleen C. Weathers + 2 more
    • English
    Fundamentals of Ecosystem Science provides a compact and comprehensive introduction to modern ecosystem science. This book covers major concepts of ecosystem science, biogeochemistry, and energetics. It addresses, contrasts, and compares both terrestrial and aquatic ecosystems. It combines general lessons, concepts, frameworks, and challenges in highly accessible synthesis chapters. It presents firsthand case studies, written by leaders in the field, offering personal insights into how adopting an ecosystem approach led to innovations, new understanding, management changes, and policy solutions. This book is ideal for advanced undergraduate and graduate students who have had a general biology course, but not further training in ecosystems as well as researchers and professionals in ecology and environmental sciences.

  • Ecosystems in a Human-Modified Landscape

    A European Perspective
    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 44
    • English
    Advances in Ecological Research is one of the most successful series in the highly competitive field of ecology. Each volume publishes topical and important reviews, interpreting ecology as widely as in the past, to include all material that contributes to our understanding of the field. Topics in this invaluable series include the physiology, populations, and communities of plants and animals, as well as landscape and ecosystem ecology.

  • Lake Ecosystem Ecology

    A Global Perspective
    • 1st Edition
    • Gene E. Likens
    • English
    A derivative of the Encyclopedia of Inland Waters, Lake Ecosystem Ecology examines the workings of the lake and reservoir ecosystems of our planet. Information and perspectives crucial to the understanding and management of current environmental problems are covered, such as eutrophication, acid rain and climate change. Because the articles are drawn from an encyclopedia, the articles are easily accessible to interested members of the public, such as conservationists and environmental decision makers.

  • River Ecosystem Ecology

    A Global Perspective
    • 1st Edition
    • Gene E. Likens
    • English
    A derivative of the Encyclopedia of Inland Waters, River Ecosystem Ecology reviews the function of rivers and streams as ecosystems as well as the varied activities and interactions that occur among their abiotic and biotic components. Because the articles are drawn from an encyclopedia, the articles are easily accessible to interested members of the public, such as conservationists and environmental decision makers.

  • The Riverine Ecosystem Synthesis

    Toward Conceptual Cohesiveness in River Science
    • 1st Edition
    • James H. Thorp + 2 more
    • English
    This book presents the most comprehensive model yet for describing the structure and functioning of running freshwater ecosystems. Riverine Ecosystems Synthesis (RES) is a result of combining several theories published in recent decades, dealing with aquatic and terrestrial systems. New analyses are fused with a variety of new perspectives on how river network ecosystems are structured and function, and how they change along longitudinal, lateral, and temporal dimensions. Among these novel perspectives is a dramatically new view of the role of hydrogeomorphic forces in forming functional process zones from headwaters to the mouths of great rivers. Designed as a useful tool for aquatic scientists worldwide whether they work on small streams or great rivers and in forested or semi-arid regions, this book will provide a means for scientists to understand the fundamental and applied aspects of rivers in general and includes a practical guide and protocols for analyzing individual rivers. Specific examples of rivers in at least four continents (Africa, Australia, Europe and North America) serve to illustrate the power and utility of the RES concept.

  • Ecology of Insular Southeast Asia

    The Indonesian Archipelago
    • 1st Edition
    • Friedhelm Goltenboth + 3 more
    • English
    The textbook entitled Tropical Ecology of Southeast Asia – The Indonesian Archipelago unfolds in its 5 major chapters with 20 subchapters on more than 500 pages, with more than 300 figures, the basic principles of ecology with examples mainly coming from the Indonesian Archipelago. After an introduction describing the geography, geology and climate of the region, the second chapter is dedicated to marine and freshwater ecosystems. Chapters on the functional ecology of seagrass beds, coral reefs, open ocean and deep sea are followed by information on lotic and lentic freshwater ecosystems. In chapter III ecotones and special ecosystems of the achipelago are in focus. The ecology and ecosystems of shore and tidal flats, mangroves, estuaries and soft bottom shores, caves, small islands, grasslands and savannas are decribed. The forest ecosystems with beach forest, tropical lowland evergreen rainforest, some special forest systems and mountain forests form the contents of chapter IV. The final chapter V is dealing with agroecosystems and human ecology. The main focus in this chapter is ricefield ecology, landuse systems and social ecology, including the advent of man and the development and expansion of man influencing this achipelago. An extended glossary and bibliography is added as well as tables of abbreviations, conversion factors, international system of units and measurements or SI and a geological time table and systematics. The index gives assess to important keywords and relevant information spread thoughout the contents of the book. The textbook will certainly be useful to teachers, lecturers and their students at university and college level. It also gives an overview about insular ecology of the vast Indonesian archipelago to any interested person or working ecologist.

  • Dynamic Food Webs

    Multispecies Assemblages, Ecosystem Development and Environmental Change
    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 3
    • Peter C de Ruiter + 2 more
    • English
    Dynamic Food Webs challenges us to rethink what factors may determine ecological and evolutionary pathways of food web development. It touches upon the intriguing idea that trophic interactions drive patterns and dynamics at different levels of biological organization: dynamics in species composition, dynamics in population life-history parameters and abundances, and dynamics in individual growth, size and behavior. These dynamics are shown to be strongly interrelated governing food web structure and stability and the role of populations and communities play in ecosystem functioning. Dynamic Food Webs not only offers over 100 illustrations, but also contains 8 riveting sections devoted to an understanding of how to manage the effects of environmental change, the protection of biological diversity and the sustainable use of natural resources. Dynamic Food Webs is a volume in the Theoretical Ecology series.

  • Food Webs: From Connectivity to Energetics

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 36
    • English
    The most recent volume of this series, Advances in Ecological Research, demonstrates a captivating knowledge of recent advances in the analysis of food webs. A food web describes the network of predator-prey interactions within a community. The simplest description of a food web specifies only who eats whom (a connectance web), with no indication of how much or how often. Chapters in this book begin with a discussion of the most detailed connectance webs ever compiled, and advance to incorporate information on the body size and numerical abundance of the species. The results yield new ways of describing food webs and powerful new models for estimating patterns of energy flow in ecosystems.

  • Fundamentals of Soil Ecology

    • 2nd Edition
    • David C. Coleman + 1 more
    • English
    This fully revised and expanded edition of Fundamentals of Soil Ecology continues its holistic approach to soil biology and ecosystem function. Students and ecosystem researchers will gain a greater understanding of the central roles that soils play in ecosystem development and function. The authors emphasize the increasing importance of soils as the organizing center for all terrestrial ecosystems and provide an overview of theory and practice of soil ecology, both from an ecosystem and evolutionary biology point of view. This volume contains updated and greatly expanded coverage of all belowground biota (roots, microbes and fauna) and methods to identify and determine its distribution and abundance. New chapters are provided on soil biodiversity and its relationship to ecosystem processes, suggested laboratory and field methods to measure biota and their activities in ecosystems..

  • Ecosystems of the Deep Oceans

    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 28
    • P.A. Tyler
    • English
    This volume examines the deep sea ecosystem from a variety of perspectives. The initial chapters examine the deep-sea floor, the deep pelagic environment and the more specialised chemosynthetic environments of hydrothermal vents and cold seeps. These environments are examined from the perspective of the relationship of deep-sea animals to their physico-chemical environment.Later chapters examine the biogeography of the main deep oceans (Atlantic, Pacific and Indian) with particular attention to the downward flux of surface-derived organic matter and how this drives the processes within the deep-sea ecosystem. The peripheral deep seas including the polar seas and the marginal deep seas (inter alia the Mediterranean, Red, Caribbean and Okhotsk seas) are explored in the same context. The final chapters examine the processes occurring in the deep sea and include an analysis of why the deep sea has high species diversity, how the fauna respond to organic input and how species have adapted reproductive activity in the deep sea. The volume concludes with an analysis of the anthropogenic impact on the deep sea.

  • Large Marine Ecosystems of the North Atlantic

    Changing States and Sustainability
    • 1st Edition
    • Volume 10
    • H.R. Skjoldal + 1 more
    • English
    This is the first book to provide assessments of multidecadal changes in resources and environments of the Large Marine Ecosystems (LMEs) of the North Atlantic. Using the case study method, researchers examine the forces driving the changes and actions underway aimed at turning the corner from declining trends in biomass yields, toward recovery of depleted species populations and improvements in ecosystem integrity.Recently a distinguished group of 24 scientists argued eloquently that a new Sustainability Science was emerging that was focused on "meeting fundamental human needs while preserving the life support systems of planet Earth". The contributions contained in this volume are at the cutting edge of Sustainability Science and the results presented by the contributors are pertinent to one of the core questions: "How are long-term trends in environment and development, including consumption and population, reshaping nature-society interactions in ways relevant to sustainability?" (Science Vol. 292, 27 April 2001). The case studies demonstrate the utility of an ecosystem-based approach to the assessment and management of biomass yields and species sustainability.Movem... toward ecosystem-based management have emerged from the case studies on the initiation of recoveries of several depleted groundfish stocks of the US Northeast Shelf LME; the collapse of the Newfoundland-Labrado... Shelf cod; the assessment of physical and biological changes on the Scotian Shelf, West Greenland Shelf, Iceland Shelf LME, and the Faroe Plateau, the North Sea, and the Barents Sea LMEs. Uncertainties, with regard to environmental and human-generated forcing, are addressed in assessment of the states of the Iberian Coastal and Biscay-Celtic LMEs, and in broad-scale studies of the influences at the base of the food chain of climatic variability on the productivity and biodiversity of plankton communities of the North Atlantic. The volume concludes with an insightful perspective on the approaches used and the results reported by the eminent marine scientist and former President of ICES, Professor Gotthilf Hempel.

  • Long-Term Studies of Vertebrate Communities

    • 1st Edition
    • Martin L. Cody + 1 more
    • English
    This unique book synthesizes the ongoing long-term community ecology studies of fish, amphibians, reptiles, birds, and mammals. The studies have been conducted from deserts to rainforests as well as in terrestrial, freshwater, and marine habitats and provide valuable insight that can be obtained only through persistent, diligent, and year-after-year investigation.Long-T... Studies of Vertebrate Communities is ideal for faculty, researchers, graduate students, and undergraduates in vertebrate biology, ecology, and evolutionary biology, including ecology, natural history, and systematics.

  • Introduction to Ecological Biochemistry

    • 4th Edition
    • J. B. Harborne
    • English
    Ecological biochemistry concerns the biochemistry of interactions between animals, plants and the environment, and includes such diverse subjects as plant adaptations to soil pollutants and the effects of plant toxins on herbivores. The intriguing dependence of the Monarch butterfly on its host plants is chosen as an example of plant-animal coevolution in action. The ability to isolate trace amounts of a substance from plant tissues has led to a wealth of new research, and the fourth edition of this well-known text has consequently been extensively revised. New sections have been provided on the cost of chemical defence and on the release of predator-attracting volatiles from plants. New information has been included on cyanogenesis, the protective role of tannins in plants and the phenomenon of induced defence in plant leaves following herbivory. Advanced level students and research workers aloke will find much of value in this comprehensive text, written by an acknowledged expert on this fascinating subject.

  • Water at the Surface of Earth

    An Introduction to Ecosystem Hydrodynamics
    • 1st Edition
    • David M. Miller
    • English
    Water at the Surface of the Earth: An Introduction to Ecosystem Hydrodynamics provides an introduction to the ways in which biological, physical, cultural, and urban systems at the surface of the earth operate, with a particular focus on the hydrodynamics of ecosystems, i.e., water and its association with other forms of matter, including pollutants, and with several forms of energy. The chapter sequence in this book follows the downward progress of water from the lower atmosphere, through ecosystems at the earth's surface, through the soil and mantle rock, to the ""waters under the earth."" In other words, the book begins with input of water to ecosystems, then describes how it is processed in these systems, and ends with the liquid water yield from them. The book first discusses storms in the atmosphere. These are systems that convert inflows of water vapor into outflows of raindrops and snowflakes that are precipitated to the underlying surface. This is followed by separate chapters on how water is delivered from the atmosphere to surface ecosystems; water budgets at the surface and in the soil; evaporation from these systems back to the atmosphere; water in the local air and rocks; and horizontal movement of water transformed by ecosystems where the preceding storages and fluxes were located.