Journal
ECOLOGY LETTERS
Volume 20, Issue 2, Pages 147-157Publisher
WILEY
DOI: 10.1111/ele.12717
Keywords
Hierarchy theory; landscape ecology; macrosystems ecology; space-time; spatio-temporal
Categories
Funding
- National Science Foundation [Graduate Research Fellowship] [DGE-1242789]
- Long-term Ecological Research Program (Coweeta LTER) [DEB-1440485]
- Water Sustainability and Climate Program [DEB 1038759]
- Macrosystems Biology and Early NEON Science [EF 1638704]
- Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (doctoral fellowship)
- David H. Smith Conservation Research Fellowship Program
- University of Wisconsin-Madison Vilas Trust
- Department of Biological Sciences at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
- Long-term Ecological Research Program (North Temperate Lakes LTER) [DEB 1440297]
- Direct For Biological Sciences
- Division Of Environmental Biology [1440297, 1440485] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
- Directorate For Geosciences
- Division Of Earth Sciences [1038759] Funding Source: National Science Foundation
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Macrosystems ecology is an effort to understand ecological processes and interactions at the broadest spatial scales and has potential to help solve globally important social and ecological challenges. It is important to understand the intellectual legacies underpinning macrosystems ecology: How the subdiscipline fits within, builds upon, differs from and extends previous theories. We trace the rise of macrosystems ecology with respect to preceding theories and present a new hypothesis that integrates the multiple components of macrosystems theory. The spatio-temporal anthropogenic rescaling (STAR) hypothesis suggests that human activities are altering the scales of ecological processes, resulting in interactions at novel space-time scale combinations that are diverse and predictable. We articulate four predictions about how human actions are expanding, shrinking, speeding up and slowing down ecological processes and interactions, and thereby generating new scaling relationships for ecological patterns and processes. We provide examples of these rescaling processes and describe ecological consequences across terrestrial, freshwater and marine ecosystems. Rescaling depends in part on characteristics including connectivity, stability and heterogeneity. Our STAR hypothesis challenges traditional assumptions about how the spatial and temporal scales of processes and interactions operate in different types of ecosystems and provides a lens through which to understand macrosystem-scale environmental change.
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