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Q: |
What are
Anthromes?
(Anthropogenic Biomes,
Human Biomes) |
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A: |
Anthromes, also known as Anthropogenic Biomes,
or Human Biomes, are the globally
significant ecological
patterns created by sustained interactions between humans and
ecosystems, including urban,
village,
cropland,
rangeland and
seminatural anthromes. Just as the
classic biomes are formed by
global patterns of climate, anthromes are formed by global
patterns in human populations and their use of land over the
long-term. The term was originated by
Erle Ellis and Navin Ramankutty in 2007 in
their paper in Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment
as a more comprehensive way to integrate humans into global
ecology.
Anthropogenic Biomes entry at Encyclopedia of Earth. |
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Q: |
What are
Biomes? |
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A: |
Biomes are fundamental units of biology and ecology,
representing globally significant patterns of life across the
biosphere. In the classic definition of biomes, these are
tropical rainforests, grasslands, deserts and other ecosystems
defined by global patterns in climate.
Biomes
entry at Encyclopedia of Earth. |
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Q: |
Are biomes obsolete? |
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A: |
No. Even though humans have transformed most of
the terrestrial biosphere into anthromes, biomes remain useful
both as a basic concept in biology and ecology
(globally-significant large-scale units of ecosystem form and
function- anthromes are merely "anthropogenic biomes") and
because the classic biomes
defined by climate are
still useful global units for ecology, differentiating profound
global variations in ecosystem form and function, including
biodiversity and primary productivity. |
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Q: |
What is the difference between
Anthromes versions 1 and
2, and why distinguish between them? |
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A: |
Anthromes version 1
represents the first classification of globally significant ecological patterns created by humans.
Anthromes 1 classification used statistical methods (two-step
cluster
analysis) to identify and map anthromes using global data for human population density, land use
and land cover, resulting in an empirical classification consisting of
21 anthrome classes, three of them wild.
Anthromes version 2 is
based on the
patterns identified in version 1, but simplified to 19 anthrome
classes (2 of them wild) and classifies anthromes based on human
population density and land use data using standard rules that allow consistent
classification across time periods. While the identity of
Anthromes v1 classes are more strongly linked to empirical analysis
of global data, making them more objective, their identification
cannot be made consistent across datasets (their identities are
optimized to the data itself), so Anthromes v2 classification (or
another similar method) is required to facilitate analysis of
historical changes in the biosphere. |
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Q: |
What are
Seminatural anthromes? |
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A: |
Seminatural anthromes are created when humans use land at
relatively low levels (<20% of land used for crops, pasture or
urban). This Anthrome
level was added in
Anthromes version 2, building on the
Forested anthrome level
identifed in Anthromes version 1, which had
relatively low levels of use, but adding lightly used anthromes
without forest cover as well (Seminatural treeless and barren
lands). |
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Q: |
What are
Anthrome
"Levels"? |
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A: |
Anthrome Levels ("groups"
in
Anthromes v1) are broad categories comprising multiple anthrome
classes. For example, Villages are an anthrome level,
comprised of rice villages,
rainfed villages,
irrigated villages,
and so forth. |
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Q: |
What are
"Human Systems"? |
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A: |
Human systems emerge from
human interactions. As individuals, and even as populations, humans
are just another species. Human systems, on the other hand,
represent the integrated effects of humans interacting with each
other at scales capable of forcing changes in the atmosphere,
lithosphere, biosphere and other earth systems. Human systems have
emerged as new primary earth systems, both by dramatically altering
preexisting natural processes and more importantly, by introducing a
host of new earth system-processes entirely novel to the earth
system. |
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Q: |
Are there
marine and aquatic anthromes? |
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A: |
While it might be possible to classify and
map human influences on marine and other aquatic ecosystems, in the
case of marine ecosystems, they are too dynamic, changing with
currents and seasons, to map as static biomes- the ideal
classification and mapping of marine biomes is dynamic, changing
over time- and recently this has been accomplished using remote
sensing of the oceans. |
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