Ecological Systems, Introduction - Ecological Systems - page 2

by professionals in government, universities, and industry. The reader is also
directed to the closely related sections: Earth System Monitoring, Introduction
and also Transport and Fate of Chemicals in the Environment, Introduction .
Each of the entries is summarized below.
Ecosystems, Adaptive Management - Adaptive management is an approach to
natural resource management that emphasizes learning through management
based upon the philosophy that knowledge is incomplete and much of what is
thought to be known is actually wrong, but despite uncertainty managers and
policymakers must act. This entry includes: Structure Decision Making, Participa-
tory Active Adaptive Management, Adaptive Governance, and Adaptive Manage-
ment and Law.
Marine Biogeochemistry - The biogeochemistry of the world oceans has been
studied for many decades, and major advances in understanding have been linked
with development of new techniques and tools that allow the accurate representa-
tion of various organic and inorganic pools within the water. It has been shown that
some critical bioactive compounds (containing the elements: carbon, nitrogen,
phosphorus, oxygen) occur with particular atomic ratios to one another that are
relatively invariant over space and time pools. The following cycles are presented
in detail: carbon ocean Acidification, nitrogen and phosphorous, iron (including
iron ocean fertilization), sulfur, and oxygen.
Atmospheric Biogeochemistry - Biogeochemistry represents the interaction of
biology, chemistry, and geology in the Earth system. For many processes, an
understanding of biological uptake and emission, chemical processing, and geo-
logical sequestration is necessary to resolve the sources and sinks of a particular
constituent. For example to discover the sources and sinks of atmospheric carbon
dioxide, it is important to understand how biota take up carbon dioxide and
chemically convert the carbon to organic carbon, and then how this organic carbon
is used either to produce energy by biota or is deposited to the land or ocean surface
and can become sequestered in geological formations. Often when biogeochem-
istry is referred to, one refers to the nutrient cycling of important nutrients.
Atmospheric biogeochemistry, as defined in its narrowest sense, is the flux of
nutrients and pollutants important for biogeochemistry through the atmosphere. In
its broadest sense, atmospheric biogeochemistry is the interaction of the atmo-
sphere and atmospheric processes with the biogeochemistry of the earth system.
This broader definition is used here.
Ecological Succession and Community Dynamics - Ecological succession and the
dynamic change of communities is one of the pillars of modern ecology and it has
considerable influence on sustainability science. The processes that drive succession
and the regularly of patterns of succession have been the topic of considerable debate
over the past century - due in no small part to the importance of the concept to basic and
applied ecology. Succession is at its simplest level the pattern of change in ecological
communities and these changes can be read on the landscape if one knows regional
history or conversely can be used to interpret a landscape's history.