In this volume John Murray investigates the ecological processes that control the distribution, abundance, and species diversity of benthic foraminifera in environments ranging from marsh to the deepest ocean. To interpret the fossil record it is necessary to have an understanding of the ecology of modern foraminifera and the processes operating after death leading to burial and fossilisation. This book presents the ecological background required to explain how fossil forms are used in dating rocks and reconstructing past environmental features including changes of sea level. It demonstrates how living foraminifera can be used to monitor modern-day environmental change. Ecology and Applications of Benthic Foraminifera presents a comprehensive and global coverage of the subject using all the available literature. It is supported by a website hosting a large database of additional ecological information (www.cambridge.org/0521828392) and will form an important reference for academic researchers and graduate students in Earth and Environmental Sciences.

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Ecology and Applications of Benthic Foraminifera

Landscape ecology is based on the premise that there are strong links between ecological pattern and ecological function and process. Ecological systems are spatially heterogeneous, exhibiting considerable complexity and variability in time and space. This variability is typically represented by categorical maps or by a collection of samples taken at specific spatial locations (point data). Categorical maps quantize variability by identifying patches that are relatively homogeneous and that exhibit a relatively abrupt transition to adjacent areas. Alternatively, point-data analysis (geostatistics) assumes that the system property is spatially continuous, making fewer assumptions about the nature of spatial structure. Each data model provides capabilities that the other does not, and they should be considered complementary. Although the concept of patches is intuitive and consistent with much of ecological theory, point-data analysis can answer two of the most critical questions in spatial pattern analysis: what is the appropriate scale to conduct the analysis, and what is the nature of the spatial structure? I review the techniques to evaluate categorical maps and spatial point data, and make observations about the interpretation of spatial pattern indices and the appropriate application of the techniques. Pattern analysis techniques are most useful when applied and interpreted in the context of the organism(s) and ecological processes of interest, and at appropriate scales, although some may be useful as coarse-filter indicators of ecosystem function. I suggest several important needs for future research, including continued investigation of scaling issues, development of indices that measure specific components of spatial pattern, and efforts to make point-data analysis more compatible with ecological theory.

https://www.umass.edu/landeco/teaching/landscape_ecology/references/Gustafson_1998.pdf

Quantifying Landscape Spatial Pattern: What Is the State of the Art?

The concept of self-organized criticality was introduced to explain the behaviour of the sandpile model. In this model, particles are randomly dropped onto a square grid of boxes. When a box accumulates four particles they are redistributed to the four adjacent boxes or lost off the edge of the grid. Redistributions can lead to further instabilities with the possibility of more particles being lost from the grid, contributing to the size of each ‘avalanche’. These model ‘avalanches’ satisfied a power-law frequency‐area distribution with a slope near unity. Other cellular-automata models, including the slider-block and forest-fire models, are also said to exhibit self-organized critical behaviour. It has been argued that earthquakes, landslides, forest fires, and species extinctions are examples of self-organized criticality in nature. In addition, wars and stock market crashes have been associated with this behaviour. The forest-fire model is particularly interesting in terms of its relation to the critical-point behaviour of the sitepercolation model. In the basic forest-fire model, trees are randomly planted on a grid of points. Periodically in time, sparks are randomly dropped on the grid. If a spark drops on a tree, that tree and adjacent trees burn in a model fire. The fires are the ‘avalanches’ and they are found to satisfy power-law frequency‐area distributions with slopes near unity. This forest-fire model is closely related to the site-percolation model, that exhibits critical behaviour. In the forest-fire model there is an inverse cascade of trees from small clusters to large clusters, trees are lost primarily from model fires that destroy the largest clusters. This quasi steady-state cascade gives a power-law frequency‐area distribution for both clusters of trees and smaller fires. The site-percolation model is equivalent to the forest-fire model without fires. In this case there is a transient cascade of trees from small to large clusters and a power-law distribution is found only at a critical density of trees.

/pdf/self-organized-criticality-4v87dkoa15.pdf

Self-organized criticality

Much as Rachel Carson's \"Silent Spring\" was a call to action against the pesticides that were devastating bird populations, Charles S. Elton's classic \"The Ecology of Invasions by Animals and Plants\" sounded an early warning about an environmental catastrophe that has become all too familiar today-the invasion of nonnative species. From kudzu to zebra mussels to Asian long-horned beetles, nonnative species are colonizing new habitats around the world at an alarming rate thanks to accidental and intentional human intervention. One of the leading causes of extinctions of native animals and plants, invasive species also wreak severe economic havoc, causing $79 billion worth of damage in the United States alone. Elton explains the devastating effects that invasive species can have on local ecosystems in clear, concise language and with numerous examples. The first book on invasion biology, and still the most cited, Elton's masterpiece provides an accessible, engaging introduction to one of the most important environmental crises of our time. Charles S. Elton was one of the founders of ecology, who also established and led Oxford University's Bureau of Animal Population. His work has influenced generations of ecologists and zoologists, and his publications remain central to the literature in modern biology. \"History has caught up with Charles Elton's foresight, and \"The Ecology of Invasions\" can now be seen as one of the central scientific books of our century.\"-David Quammen, from the Foreword to \"Killer Algae: The True Tale of a Biological Invasion\

The Ecology of Invasions by Animals and Plants

Preface 1. Spatial concepts and notions 2. Ecological and spatial processes 3. Points, lines and graphs 4. Spatial analysis of complete point location data 5. Contiguous units analysis 6. Spatial analysis of sample data 7. Spatial relationship and multiscale analysis 8. Spatial autocorrelation and inferential tests 9. Spatial partitioning: spatial clusters and boundary detection 10. Spatial diversity analysis 11. Spatio-temporal analysis 12. Closing comments and future directions References Index.

Spatial Analysis A Guide for Ecologists

Lacunarity analysis is a multiscaled method for describing patterns of spatial dispersion. It can be used with both binary and quantitative data in one, two, and three dimensions. Although originally developed for fractal objects, the method is more general and can be readily used to describe nonfractal and multifractal patterns. Lacunarity analysis is broadly applicable to many data sets used in the natural sciences; we illustrate its application to both geological and ecological data. {copyright} {ital 1996 The American Physical Society.}

https://www.geobabble.org/~hnw/plotnick.pdf

Lacunarity analysis: A general technique for the analysis of spatial patterns

Lacunarity analysis is a multi-scaled method of determining the texture associated with patterns of spatial dispersion (i.e., habitat types or species locations) for one-, two-, and three-dimensional data. Lacunarity provides a parsimonious analysis of the overall fraction of a map or transect covered by the attribute of interest, the degree of contagion, the presence of self-similarity, the presence and scale of randomness, and the existence of hierarchical structure. For self-similar patterns, it can be used to determine the fractal dimension. The method is easily implemented on the computer and provides readily interpretable graphic results. Differences in pattern can be detected even among very sparsely occupied maps.

Lacunarity indices as measures of landscape texture

Every living organism represents a potentialfossil, although only a few are ever successfully fossilized. Taphonomic studies should explain episodes of both fossilization and of non-fossilization. This paper examines some of the taphonomic variables that may bias the arthropod fossil record. The short-term preservation potential of the modern carid shrimp, Pandalus danae, was studied in a variety of laboratory and field settings. Freshly killed specimens were buried at two intertidal localities on San Juan Island, Puget Sound, Washington. Carcasses were buried at depths of 5-20 cm for periods of one day to three weeks. Destruction by scavengers (crabs?) was the probable primary cause of carcass destruction. Further breakdown was caused by bacterial decomposition and disturbance by burrowing infauna. Shrimp remains were placed in a series of glass jars in the laboratory. Jars differed in the presence and kind of enclosed sediment and in the degree of aeration. Decomposition destroyed nearly all soft tissues within a period of two weeks. The cuticle became extremely soft, resulting in loss of physical integrity of the remains. Differences between oxic and anoxic decomposition were minor. These results, along with a consideration of the biological, physical, and chemical effects of bioturbation, suggest that disturbance by scavengers or burrowing infauna is a majorfactor in the destruction of buried arthropod remains. The absence or inhibition of bioturbation may be a necessary condition for arthropod preservation. The preservation potential of arthropods, and of other soft-bodied forms, may have declined since the Paleozoic.

Taphonomy of a modern shrimp: implications for the arthropod fossil record

Several recent studies have suggested that there is a negative log-linear relationship between sedimentation rates and the time span over which they are measured; i.e., measured sedimentation rates are slow when measured over long time spans and rapid when measured over short time spans. This relationship may be due to the inclusion of more and longer hiatuses over long time spans. This paper proposes a mathematical model, consistent with this relationship, that is based upon the fractal "Cantor bar." This model allows the estimation of the relative number and durations of stratigraphic hiatuses within a given section.

A Fractal Model for the Distribution of Stratigraphic Hiatuses

Image analysis techniques and gray-level co-occurrence matrices (GLCM) for calculating bioturbation indices and characterizing biogenic sedimentary structures

Roy E. Plotnick

Papers

Lacunarity analysis: A general technique for the analysis of spatial patterns

Lacunarity indices as measures of landscape texture

Taphonomy of a modern shrimp: implications for the arthropod fossil record

A Fractal Model for the Distribution of Stratigraphic Hiatuses

Image analysis techniques and gray-level co-occurrence matrices (GLCM) for calculating bioturbation indices and characterizing biogenic sedimentary structures