Author(s):
Derek T. Robinson* - School of Natural Resources & Environment, Center for the Study of Complex Systems, University of Michigan
Daniel G. Brown - School of Natural Resources & Environment, Center for the Study of Complex Systems, University of Michigan
William S. Currie - School of Natural Resources & Environment
Abstract:
Land-use and land-cover change (LUCC) has a number of local complexities and feedbacks that produce global consequences (e.g. changes to carbon cycling and climate). Modeling initiatives focused on LUCC have been successful at coupling human-environment systems in an effort to understand 1) human and environment mechanisms that drive LUCC, 2) how these mechanisms interact, and 3) how these mechanisms influence processes at the global scale. Also, some LUCC models have mapped (with measured error) observed spatial patterns of change. Despite these and other successes, previous efforts have fallen short of incorporating spatial treatment of ecological functions (e.g. biogeochemical cycling) at local to regional scales and how those functions affect and are affected by human systems. One method to accomplish this task involves the integration of ecosystem process models with our current LUCC models. Ecosystem process models are focused on biogeochemical cycling and have proven useful in global change research because they can quantify evapotranspiration, water use efficiency, carbon and other nutrient pools and fluxes. However, ecosystem process models applied at regional and global scales typically do not incorporate adjacency effects and therefore are not influenced by land-cover configuration which is a primary output of LUCC models. Therefore to evaluate the ecological consequences of land-use policies and LUCC modelling scenarios requires 1) an approach to parameterizing edge-effects into ecosystem process models (i.e. adjacency effects), and 2) linking land-use to biophysical characteristics such as leaf-area-index. The conceptual model for these steps and linkages is presented.
