Identification and ranking of environmental threats with ecosystem vulnerability distributions.

ABSTRACT: Responses of ecosystems to human-induced stress vary in space and time, because both stressors and ecosystem vulnerabilities vary in space and time. Presently, ecosystem impact assessments mainly take into account variation in stressors, without considering variation in ecosystem vulnerability. We developed a method to address ecosystem vulnerability variation by quantifying ecosystem vulnerability distributions (EVDs) based on monitoring data of local species compositions and environmental conditions. The method incorporates spatial variation of both abiotic and biotic variables to quantify variation in responses among species and ecosystems. We show that EVDs can be derived based on a selection of locations, existing monitoring data and a selected impact boundary, and can be used in stre

SUBMITTER: Zijp MC 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5571148 | biostudies-literature | 2017 Aug

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature