This volume is a synthesis of the NASA funded work under the Land-Cover and Land-Use Change Program. Hundreds of scientists have worked for the past eight years to understand one of the most important forces that is changing our planet-human impacts on land cover, that is land use. Its contributions span the natural and the social sciences, and apply state-of-the-art techniques for understanding the earth: satellite remote sensing, geographic information systems, modeling, and advanced computing. It brings together detailed case studies, regional analyses, and globally scaled mapping efforts.

This is the most organized effort made to understand the dominant force that has been responsible for changing the Earth's biosphere.

Audience: This publication will be of interest to students, scientists, and policy makers.

This volume includes a CD-ROM containing full color images of a selection of illustrations which are printed in black-and-white in the book.

Inhalt

LCLUC Concepts; National and International Programs.- The Development of the International Land-Use and Land-Cover Change (LUCC) Research Program and Its Links to NASA's Land-Cover and Land-Use Change (LCLUC) Initiative.- The NASA Land Cover and Land Use Change Program.- Meeting the Goals of GOFC.- Observations of LCLUC: Case Studies.- Forest Change and Human Driving Forces in Central America.- Pattern to Process in the Amazon Region.- Towards an Operational Forest Monitoring System for Central Africa.- Land Use and Land Cover Change in Southeast Asia.- Northern Eurasia.- Land Cover Disturbances and Feedbacks to the Climate System in Canada and Alaska.- Mapping Desertification in Southern Africa.- Woodland Expansion in US Grasslands.- Arid Land Agriculture in Northeastern Syria.- Changes in Land Cover and Land Use in the Pearl River Delta, China.- Cross Cutting Themes, Impacts and Consequences.- The Effects of Land Use and Management on the Global Carbon Cycle.- Land Use and Hydrology.- Land Use Change and Biodiversity.- Land Use and Climate.- Urbanization.- Land Use and Fires.- Land Cover / Use and Population.- Methodological Issues, Modeling.- Trends in Land Cover Mapping and Monitoring.- Linking Pixels and People.- Modeling Land Use and Land Cover Change.- Synthesis and Lessons: Biophysical Change and Beyond.- Land-Use and Land-Cover Change Pathways and Impacts.- Integrated Land-Change Science and Its Relevance to the Human Sciences.- Research Directions in Land-Cover and Land-Use Change.