"Ecosystem disturbances, interactions, and landscape resilience"

生态扰动通过重新设置植物群落和动物群落聚集的舞台，在群落和生态系统生态学中发挥着重要作用。植被火灾和昆虫暴发是自然生态干扰，与森林采伐造成的人为干扰一起，对不列颠哥伦比亚省(BC)的森林结构和功能做出了贡献。这些干扰的原因和影响通常是独立研究的，然而，最近一次史无前例的山松甲虫昆虫流行提出了重要的问题，即干扰如何相互调节，以及快速连续发生的多个干扰所产生的生态后果。这项研究计划的长期目标是开发一个模型框架，以检验不列颠哥伦比亚省北部林区生态扰动相互作用的假设，作为了解这些生态系统在气候变化背景下的弹性的基石。该研究计划有四个目标：1.开发整个不列颠哥伦比亚省山松甲虫爆发的空间变化约束的模型；2.测试北部松树森林群落对山松甲虫产生的复合干扰和随后的火灾的弹性；3.确定山松甲虫的爆发是否影响野火燃烧的空间模式；以及4.检查火灾天气和火灾气候之间的关系，作为提高我们模拟过去和未来火灾活动的能力的一步。 这项研究计划有助于通过驱动干扰地理的潜在因素、干扰如何相互作用、气候的作用以及干扰相互作用的结果是否会导致植被群落与我们以前看到的显著不同，来了解北方森林的生态系统结构和功能。这些主题对于理解BCS森林生态系统及其森林经济在地方、区域和全球变化背景下的长期复原力至关重要。

Ecological disturbances play a significant role in community and ecosystem ecology by re-setting the stage on which plant and animal communities assemble. Vegetation fires and insect outbreaks are natural ecological disturbances that, along with anthropogenic disturbance from forest harvesting, contribute to forest structure and function across British Columbia (BC). The causes and effects of these disturbances are typically studied independently however a recent mountain pine beetle insect epidemic of unprecedented extent raises important questions about how disturbances regulate one another and the ecological outcome generated by multiple disturbances that occur in quick succession. The long-term objective of this research program is to develop a model framework to test hypotheses about interactions of ecological disturbances in northern forest regions of BC as a cornerstone to understanding resilience of these ecosystems in the context of changing climate. The research program has four objectives: 1. develop models of spatially varying constraints of mountain pine beetle outbreak across BC; 2. test the resilience of northern lodgepole pine forest communities to compound disturbances generated by mountain pine beetle and followed by fire; 3. determine whether mountain pine beetle outbreaks affect spatial patterns of burning by wildfire; and 4. examine the relationship between fire weather and fire climate, as a step toward improving our ability to model past and future fire activity. This research program contributes to understanding ecosystem structure and function of northern forests through a lens of underlying factors driving the geography of disturbances, how disturbances interact, the role of climate, and whether the outcome of disturbance interactions might result in vegetation communities notably different from those we've seen before. These themes are critical in understanding the long-term resilience of BCs forested ecosystems and its forest-based economy in the context of local, regional, and global change.