Peter Kedron

Bio: Peter Kedron is an academic researcher from Arizona State University. The author has contributed to research in topics: Landscape ecology & Spatial ecology. The author has an hindex of 12, co-authored 40 publications receiving 415 citations. Previous affiliations of Peter Kedron include State University of New York System & Ryerson University.

Landscape Metrics: Past Progress and Future Directions

Abstract: This paper reviews progress in the field of landscape ecology related to the development of landscape metrics (i.e., spatial pattern indices). We first review the major formative historical developments that contributed to the coalescence of landscape metrics as a sub-field of landscape ecology and then examine recent literature highlighting several shortcomings related to their utility for understanding ecological processes and discuss several alternative approaches. Recent research recognizes some limitations of the patch-mosaic model (PMM), including the landscape metrics based on it, for capturing landscape heterogeneity and measuring functionality. Collapsing land cover information into nominal classes complicates identification of ecologically meaningful relationships and effective management. We explore several alternative methods for capturing landscape functionality and spatial heterogeneity including graph-based networks and gradient surface models with associated surface metrics. With complementary patch-based, gradient, and graph network models available, the goal for landscape ecologists is to select the correct approach, or combination of approaches, for investigating the issue at hand. Biases associated with the modifiable areal unit problem (MAUP) and its connection to heterogeneity and scale—both grain and extent—complicate these decisions, but empirical tools from spatial allometry may improve the ability for landscape ecologists to assess where metrics are capturing ecological processes versus the scale-dependency of the metrics themselves.

Three dimensional (3D) spatial metrics for objects

Abstract: The increasing availability of lidar data and structure from motion processing techniques is moving pattern metric research toward the development of three-dimensional (3D) analysis. There is a need to develop spatial pattern metrics that leverage 3D datasets, such as those derived from lidar or unmanned aircraft systems technology, that are meaningful and interpretable across landscape contexts. We introduce a suite of 3D spatial pattern metrics that can be computed on gradient surfaces such as digital surface models, but are rooted in traditional, patch-based landscape metrics that are familiar and interpretable across landscape contexts. We compute a suite of 3D metrics and demonstrate their use by analyzing a landscape pattern in the built environment of New Orleans in 2002 and 2008—pre- and post- Hurricane Katrina. Lidar data are used to segment individual buildings and calculate 3D patterns at the equivalent of the patch-, class- and landscape-levels for traditional landscape metrics. 3D spatial metrics can characterize landscape patterns at multiple spatial scales. These metrics capture aspect of pattern that traditional patch-mosaic and surface metrics cannot. Future research can build from these measures to develop other measures of 3D spatial patterns that are applicable for different ecological contexts. Continuing advances in full waveform lidar may contribute to the development of more complex metrics.

Surface metrics for landscape ecology: a comparison of landscape models across ecoregions and scales

Abstract: The patch-mosaic model is lauded for its conceptual simplicity and ease with which conventional landscape metrics can be computed from categorical maps, yet many argue it is inconsistent with ecological theory. Gradient surface models (GSMs) are an alternative for representing landscapes, but adoption of surface metrics for analyzing spatial patterns in GSMs is hindered by several factors including a lack of meaningful interpretations. We investigate the performance and applicability of surface metrics across a range of ecoregions and scales to strengthen theoretical foundations for their adoption in landscape ecology. We examine metric clustering across scales and ecoregions, test correlations with patch-based metrics, and provide ecological interpretations for a variety of surface metrics with respect to forest cover to support the basis for selecting surface metrics for ecological analyses. We identify several factors complicating the interpretation of surface metrics from a landscape perspective. First, not all surface metrics are appropriate for landscape analyses. Second, true analogs between surface metrics and patch-based, landscape metrics are rare. Researchers should focus instead on how surface measures can uniquely measure spatial patterns. Lastly, scale dependencies exist for surface metrics, but relationships between metrics do not appear to change considerably with scale. Incorporating gradient surfaces into landscape ecological analyses is challenging, and many surface metrics may not have patch analogs or be ecologically relevant. For this reason, surface metrics should be considered in terms of the set of pattern elements they represent that can then be linked to landscape characteristics.

Governance in global value chains

Abstract: This book opens a fresh chapter in the debate on local enterprise clusters and their strategies for upgrading in the global economy. The authors employ a novel conceptual framework in their research on industrial clusters in Europe, Latin America and Asia and provide new perspectives and insights for researchers and policymakers alike.

The Fate of the Forest: Developers, Destroyers and Defenders of the Amazon

Abstract: The Amazon rain forest covers more than five million square kilometers, amid the territories of nine different nations. It represents over half of the planet's remaining rain forests. But is it truly in peril? And what steps are necessary to save it? To understand the future of Amazonia, one must know how its history was forged: in the eras of large pre-Columbian populations, in the gold rush of conquistadors, in centuries of slavery, in the schemes of Brazil's military dictators in the 1960s and 1970s, and in new globalized economies where Brazilian soy and beef now dominate, while the market in carbon credits raises the value of standing forest. Susanna Hecht and Alexander Cockburn show in compelling detail the panorama of destruction as it unfolded and also reveal the extraordinary turnaround that is now taking place, thanks to both social movements and the emergence of new environmental markets. Exploring the role of human hands in destroying - and saving - this vast, forested region, \"The Fate of the Forest\" pivots on the murder of Chico Mendes, the legendary labor and environmental organizer assassinated after successful confrontations with big ranchers. A multifaceted portrait of Eden under siege, complete with a new preface and afterword by the authors, this book demonstrates that those who would hold a mirror up to nature must first learn the lessons offered by some of their own people.