A millennium of increasing diversity of ecosystems until the mid-20th century
© 2022 The Authors. Global Change Biology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd.
| Veröffentlicht in: | Global change biology. - 1999. - 28(2022), 20 vom: 01. Okt., Seite 5945-5955 |
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| Format: | Online-Aufsatz |
| Sprache: | English |
| Veröffentlicht: |
2022
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| Zugriff auf das übergeordnete Werk: | Global change biology |
| Schlagworte: | Journal Article Anthropocene diversity metrics ecosystem diversity global change land-use change spatial ecology spatio-temporal |
| Zusammenfassung: | © 2022 The Authors. Global Change Biology published by John Wiley & Sons Ltd. Land-use change is widely regarded as a simplifying and homogenising force in nature. In contrast, analysing global land-use reconstructions from the 10th to 20th centuries, we found progressive increases in the number, evenness, and diversity of ecosystems (including human-modified land-use types) present across most of the Earth's land surface. Ecosystem diversity increased more rapidly after ~1700 CE, then slowed or slightly declined (depending on the metric) following the mid-20th century acceleration of human impacts. The results also reveal increasing spatial differentiation, rather than homogenisation, in both the presence-absence and area-coverage of different ecosystem types at sub-global scales-at least, prior to the mid-20th century. Nonetheless, geographic homogenization was revealed for a subset of analyses at a global scale, reflecting the now-global presence of certain human-modified ecosystem types. Our results suggest that, while human land-use changes have caused declines in relatively undisturbed or "primary" ecosystem types, they have also driven increases in ecosystem diversity over the last millennium |
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| Beschreibung: | Date Completed 15.09.2022 Date Revised 15.10.2022 published: Print-Electronic Citation Status MEDLINE |
| ISSN: | 1365-2486 |
| DOI: | 10.1111/gcb.16335 |