- List of tables, figures and maps Foreword Introduction
- CHAPTER 1: THE BIOSPHERE The living planet Productivity and the carbon cycle
- CHAPTER 2: THE DIVERSITY OF ORGANISMS Biodiversity Evolution and systematics Groups and names Species concepts and diversity assessment Numbers of living species The diversity of living organisms The phyla of living organisms
- CHAPTER 3: BIODIVERSITY THROUGH TIME The fossil record Patterns of diversification Patterns of extinction
- CHAPTER 4: HUMANS AND BIODIVERSITY Use of natural resources Human origins Impacts of early hominids on the environment Appropriation of net primary production Current use of wild resources
- CHAPTER 5: PATTERNS AND TRENDS IN GLOBAL BIODIVERSITY The distribution of biological diversity Diversity as a basis for conservation action Global trends in biodiversity Recent vertebrate extinctions
- CHAPTER 6: MARINE BIODIVERSITY The seas The composition and movement of seawater The major zones of the oceans The basis of life in the seas Biological diversity in the seas Vertebrate diversity in the seas Major marine communities Shallow water communities Corals and coral reefs Seagrasses Algae and kelp forests Oceanic pelagic communities Deep-sea communities Human use of and impact on the oceans World marine capture fisheries Other major impacts on the marine biosphere The current status of marine biodiversity Management of marine ecosystems
- CHAPTER 7: TERRESTRIAL BIODIVERSITY The terrestrial biosphere Forests Temperate needleleaf forests Tropical moist forests Tropical dry forests Sparse trees and parkland Forest plantations Changes in forest cover Pressures on forest biodiversity Forest protection and management Non-forest ecosystems Tundra Grasslands and savannas Shrublands Deserts and semi-deserts The status of terrestrial biodiversity
- CHAPTER 8: INLAND WATER BIODIVERSITY Inland water habitats Lotic systems: rivers and catchment basins Lentic systems Wetlands Diversity in inland waters Inland water animals Inland waters and humankind Uses of inland water species Other major factors influencing inland water ecosystems The current status of inland water biodiversity Assessment of the status of inland water ecosystems Index.
- (source: Nielsen Book Data)
Addressing the remarkable growth in concern at all levels for living things and the environment, this text also looks at increased appreciation of the links between the state of ecosystems and the state of humankind. Building on research and analysis by the conservation community worldwide, this book provides a comprehensive view of key global issues in biodiversity. It outlines some of the broad ecological relationships between humans and the rest of the material world and summarizes information on the health of the planet. Opening with an outline of some fundamental aspects of material cycles and energy flow in the biosphere, the book goes on to discuss the expansion of this diversity through geological time and the pattern of its distribution over the surface of the Earth, and trends in the condition of the main ecosystem types and the species integral to them.
(source: Nielsen Book Data)
