Sensitivity of ecological landscapes and regions to global climatic change

Abstract

Increasing awareness of the potential impacts from global climatic change has elicited a storm of research planning among all the major federal agencies. One of the primary difficulties confronted in the planning effort is the need to objectively define clear priorities for research dollars. This report is an attempt to contribute to the process of defining those priorities by scientifically defining specific regions, ecological systems, and attributes of those systems that might be particularly sensitive to climatic change. Two approaches to addressing sensitivity have been defined, intrinsic sensitivity and sensitivity relative to a particular stressor. Intrinsic sensitivity is gauged by past variations in different ecosystems. Extrinsic or stressor relative sensitivity addressed the same question, but from the perspective of a particular stress.