The purpose of this study is to clarify the relationship between the distribution of small-scale green spaces and butterfly assemblages in urbanizing areas located north-east of Ichikawa City. Landscape indices of green cover distribution with a diversity index H of vegetation types and a number of different vegetation types, GCI (Green Cluster Index) of each vegetation type and average minimum...

Methods are developed for forecasting the effects of population and economic growth on the distribution of interior forest habitat. An application to the southeastern United States shows that models provide significant explanatory power with regard to the observed distribution of interior forest. Estimates for economic and biophysical variables are significant and consistent with theory. Foreca...

BACKGROUND Urbanizing rural areas in China face a rapidly growing cardiovascular disease burden. Epidemiologic studies and effective preventive strategies are urgently needed. METHODS The Fangshan Cohort Study is a prospective study that began in 2008 and targets local residents aged 40 years or older living in 3 towns in the Fangshan district of Beijing. The baseline examination included a q...

Since China’s reform and opening-up period, the southern Jiangsu urban agglomeration has been one of fastest urbanizing regions in country. This rapid urbanization led to dramatic changes land use cover that have primary drivers carbon stock terrestrial ecosystem. In this study, we utilize Integrated Valuation Ecosystem Services Trade-offs (InVEST) model a patch-generating simulation (PLUS) ana...

Urbanization has many benefits, but it also is associated with increased levels of mental illness, including depression. It has been suggested that decreased nature experience may help to explain the link between urbanization and mental illness. This suggestion is supported by a growing body of correlational and experimental evidence, which raises a further question: what mechanism(s) link decr...

The world is rapidly urbanizing, and for the first time in history over 50% of the world’s population reside in urban areas. This rapid urbanization brings about tremendous challenges at the intersection of governance, infrastructure and the environment. Advanced sensing and data analytics techniques have been developed in the context of so called “smart cities” with the goal of providing insig...

Urbanization is one of the leading threats to freshwater biodiversity, and urban regions continue to expand globally. Here we examined the relationship between recent urbanization and shifts in stream fish communities. We sampled fishes at 32 sites in the Alameda Creek Watershed, near San Francisco, California, in 1993-1994 and again in 2009, and we quantified univariate and multivariate change...

Theoretically, co-management provides a fruitful way to engage local residents in efforts to conserve and manage particular spaces of ecological value. However, natural resource management, and biodiversity conservation in particular, are faced with novel sets of complexities in the rapidly urbanizing areas of Cape Town, South Africa, and in the nexus between an apartheid past, informal settlem...