Topic: Ecoinformatics and the Ecology of Global Change

Speaker：Prof. Jens-Christian Svenning, Ecoinformatics& Biodiversity Group, Department of Bioscience, Aarhus University, Denmark

Time：9:00—10:30 a.m. May 31, 2012

Venue：Room2321 IGSNRR

Brief to the report：

Earth’s ecosystems sustain not just biodiversity, but also human society. At the same time, the increasing human population and its resource use are causing planetary-scale changes in the Earth system via land transformation, direct biodiversity losses and introductions, effects on biogeochemistry, and climate change (global change). This global change has feedback effects on human society via impacts on ecosystem services. It is therefore a key challenge for modern science to provide a predictive understanding of global change and its impacts on Earth’s ecology. Such complex large-scale problems cannot be adequately addressed solely by classical experimental approaches. Instead creative ecoinformatics approaches are needed, integrating ecology, statistics, mathematics, and informatics. Ecoinformatics refers to the computing approach to ecology, relying on the rapid developments in information technology and associated technologies, notably in remote sensing, resulting in massive increases in computing power and data availability. Examples are given on how ecoinformatics areproviding new insights into the ecology of global change, by mapping global change dynamics, providing insights into drivers of current global ecology and global change dynamics, impacts of past global change, and the potential impacts of future global change as well as possibilities for mitigation and adaptation.