Past and Future Rapid Environmental Changes

Numerous experts including ecologists, geneticists, paleontologists and climatologists, investigate the response of terrestrial organisms to changes in their environment. The volume comprises an introductory and a final chapter by the editors as well as another 35 contributions. These are divided into six sections: 1. past environmental changes - the late-Quaternary; 2. spatial responses to past changes; 3. mechanisms enabling spatial responses; 4. evolutionary responses to past changes; 5. mechanisms enabling evolutionary responses; 6. predicted future environmental changes and simulated responses. The overwhelming and unanimous conclusion of all contributors is that forecasted global environmental changes pose a severe threat to the integrity of ecosystems worldwide and to the survival of at least some species.

Proceedings of the NATO Advanced Research Workshop "Past and Future Rapid Environmental Changes: The Spatial and Evolutionary Responses of Terrestrial Biota", held at Crieff, Scotland, June 26-30, 1995

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Section 1 - Past environmental changes - the late Quaternary.- Past environmental changes: Characteristic features of Quaternary climate variations.- Modelling late-Quaternary palaeoclimates and palaeobiomes.- Section 2 - Spatial responses to past changes.- Spatial response of plant taxa to climate change: A palaeoecological perspective.- The response of New Zealand forest diversity to Quaternary climates.- Character of rapid vegetation and climate change during the late-glacial in southernmost South America.- Holocene tree migration rates objectively determined from fossil pollen data.- Flora and vegetation of the Quaternary temperate stages of NW Europe: Evidence for large-scale range changes.- The response of beetles to Quaternary climate changes.- Fossil Coleoptera assemblages in the Great Lakes region of North America: Past changes and future prospects.- The response of Coleoptera to late-Quaternary climate changes: Evidence from north-east France.- The spatial response of mammals to Quaternary climate changes.- The spatial response of non-marine Mollusca to past climate changes.- Section 3 - Mechanisms enabling spatial responses.- Reinterpreting the fossil pollen record of Holocene tree migration.- Mechanisms of vegetation response to climate change.- Plant invasions: Early and continuing expressions of global change.- Invading into an ecologically non-uniform area.- Migratory birds and climate change.- Tree demography and migration: What stand-level measurements can tell about the response of forests to climate change.- Structural changes in the forest-tundra ecotone: A dynamic process.- Modelling the structural response of vegetation to climate change.- Section 4 - Evolutionary responses to past changes.- Species' habitats in relation to climate,evolution, migration and conservation.- The evolutionary response of vertebrates to Quaternary environmental change.- The weight of internal and external constraints on Pupilla muscorum L. (Gastropoda: Stylommatophora) during the Quaternary in Europe.- Late Quaternary extinction of large mammals in Northern Eurasia: A new look at the Siberian contribution.- Section 5 - Mechanisms enabling evolutionary responses.- Variation in plant populations: History and chance or ecology and selection?.- Genetics and adaptation to climate change: A case study of trees.- Climate change and the reproductive biology of higher plants.- Space and time as axes in intraspecific phylogeography.- Migratory birds: Simulating adaptation to environmental change.- Terrestrial Invertebrates and climate change: Physiological and life-cycle adaptations.- Section 6 - Predicted future environmental changes and simulated responses.- Forecast changes in the global environment: What they mean in terms of ecosystem responses on different time-scales.- The biogeographic consequences of forecast changes in the global environment: Individual species' potential range changes.- Gap models, forest dynamics and the response of vegetation to climate change.- Natural migration rates of trees: Global terrestrial carbon cycle implications.- Seasonal features of global net primary productivity models for the terrestrial biosphere.- General discussion and workshop conclusions.- Predicting the response of terrestrial biota to future environmental changes.- List of Workshop Participants.