Recognized as one of the richest and most extensive savannas in the world, the Cerrado region, the second largest biome in South America, presents an intense and continuous human-induced land-cover change, which has already affected around 40% of its original area. In the pursuit of orientation and planning for current and long-term occupation, in this work we present plausible deforestation scenarios for the entire Cerrado biome, to 2050.

A framework is described that has been used to assess the effect of the European Commission's Agenda 2000 proposal on the Dumfries and Galloway region, Scotland. The model assesses the impact of agriculture on land-use patterns, the environment and socio-economics of the region. It incorporates a farm-type linear programming sub-model with environmental and socio-economic sub-models.

Accurate built-up information is imperative for loss estimation and disaster management after the occurrence of catastrophic events such as earthquake, tornado, tsunami and flood. These catastrophic events leave behind a trail of mass destruction with property and human losses amounting to millions. Once a natural disaster hits a region, built-up information is required within a short span of time for disaster management. Nowadays, earth observation satellite imagery serves as a promising source to extract the land use / land cover classes.

In this study, the impact of the rapid rate of urbanization over the Pearl River Delta (PRD) region of China since the 1980s on its seasonal climate is investigated using the Weather Research and Forecasting Model. Two land-cover data are employed to simulate the urbanization effects on the regional climate in both summer (June and August) and winter (December and February) for 26 years from 1984 to 2009. Spatial and temporal features of the urbanization effect on temperature and precipitation are found to be different between summer and winter.

Satellite-derived contemporary land-cover land-use (LCLU) and albedo data and modeled future LCLU are used to study the impact of LCLU change from 2000 to 2050 on surface albedo and radiative forcing for 19 ecoregions in the eastern United States. The modeled 2000–2050 LCLU changes indicate a future decrease in both agriculture and forested land and an increase in developed land that induces ecoregion radiative forcings ranging from −0.175 to 0.432 W m⁻² driven predominately by differences in the area and type of LCLU change.

Habitat specialists living in metapopulations are sensitive to habitat fragmentation. In most studies, the effects of fragmentation on such species are analyzed based on Euclidean inter-patch distances. This approach, however, ignores the role of the landscape matrix. Recently, therefore, functional distances that account for the composition of the landscape surrounding the habitat patches have been used more frequently as indicators for patch occupancy.

Mammalian carnivores play an important role in regulating food webs and ecosystems. While many carnivore populations are facing various threats such as habitat loss and fragmentation, poaching, and illegal trade, others have adapted to human-dominated landscapes. Information about Neotropical carnivore communities in particular is limited, especially in disturbed landscapes. We conducted a camera trap survey at 38 sites across the San Juan–La Selva Biological Corridor in Costa Rica to assess occupancy and detection probabilities of the carnivore community.

Rapidly accelerating climate change in the Himalaya is projected to have major implications for montane species, ecosystems, and mountain farming and pastoral systems. A geospatial modeling approach based on a global environmental stratification is used to explore potential impacts of projected climate change on the spatial distribution of bioclimatic strata and ecoregions within the transboundary Kailash Sacred Landscape (KSL) of China, India and Nepal.

In this work, we used the Regional Hydro‐Ecological Simulation System (RHESSys) model to examine runoff sensitivity to land cover changes in a mountain environment. Two independent experiments were evaluated where we conducted simulations with multiple vegetation cover changes that include conversion to grass, no vegetation cover and deciduous/coniferous cover scenarios. The model experiments were performed at two hillslopes within the Weber River near Oakley, Utah watershed (USGS gauge # 10128500).

This paper examines the size and intensity of changes among five land categories during the two time intervals in a region of Indonesia that is pioneering negotiations concerning reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD). Maps at 1973, 1993, and 2005 indicate that land-cover change is accelerating, while carbon loss is decelerating in Jambi Province, Sumatra. Land dynamics have shifted from Forest loss during 1973–1993 to Agroforest loss during 1993–2005.

PURPOSE: Soil particle-size distribution (PSD) is an important soil physical property. Single- and multi-fractal models are increasingly used to characterize soil properties and may provide additional information. The Yellow River Delta is one of the best representative examples of river ecosystem wetlands in the world. In this area, different land resource development patterns strongly influence soil structure and fertility.

Agronomic intensification has transformed many agricultural landscapes into expansive monocultures with little natural habitat. A pervasive concern is that such landscape simplification results in an increase in insect pest pressure, and thus an increased need for insecticides. We tested this hypothesis across a range of cropping systems in the Midwestern United States, using remotely sensed land cover data, data from a national census of farm management practices, and data from a regional crop pest monitoring network.