Book Proposal - Local Perspectives on Global Ecological Change

许多种类的生态变化发生在自然和受干扰的栖息地，但许多这些变化是微妙和缓慢的。这使得科学家很难记录生态变化，公众也很难理解生态变化的范围和重要性。在中西部北部，有一些特殊的记录，使它有可能比北美温带的大多数其他地区更详细地重建长期的生态变化。研究人员建议编写和编辑一本关于生态变化的书，总结有关中西部上游栖息地动植物群落变化的科学结果。这本书的题目是《正在消失的现在：全球生态变化的地方视角》。拟议的卷将介绍和综合许多研究的结果，但将是非技术性的，以便吸引广大读者。2004年10月，学术界的科学家、机构专家、社会科学家、政治家、记者们在为期两天的研讨会上聚集在一起，发表了研究成果，并计划了该书的内容和组成。国家科学基金会的支持将用于确保及时出版，高质量的图形，并广泛分发到学校和图书馆。这本书的主要目的是告知公众和决策者关于当前生态变化的性质、规模和维度，并为未来类似的区域和大规模研究提供一个模型。

Many kinds of ecological change occur in natural and disturbed habitats, but many of these changes are subtle and slow. This makes it hard for scientists to document ecological shifts and difficult for the public to appreciate the scope and importance of ecological change. In the upper Midwest, there are exceptional records which make it possible to reconstruct longterm ecological change in more detail than most other areas of temperate North America. The investigators propose to compile and edit a book about ecological change, summarizing scientific results concerning changes in plant and animal communities across the habitats of the upper Midwest. The book will be titled "The Vanishing Present: Local perspectives on global ecological change." The proposed volume will present and synthesize findings from many studies but will be non-technical so as to appeal to a broad audience. A cademic scientists, agency professionals, social scientists, politicians, and journalists met together in October 2004 for a 2-day workshop to present results and to plan the contents and composition of the book. NSF support will be used to ensure timely publication, quality graphics, and wide distribution of the book to schools and libraries. A primary aim of the book is to inform the public and decision-makers about the nature, scale and dimensions of current ecological change and to provide a model for similar future regional and large-scale studies.