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In 1997, Grimm and Wissel made an inventory of 167 definitions used in the literature and found 70 different stability concepts. [5] One of the strategies that these two authors proposed to clarify the subject is to replace ecological stability with more specific terms, such as constancy, resilience and persistence. In order to fully describe ...
Hysteresis is an important concept in alternative stable state theory. In this ecological context, hysteresis refers to the existence of different stable states under the same variables or parameters. Hysteresis can be explained by "path-dependency", in which the equilibrium point for the trajectory of "A → B" is different from for "B → A ...
The balance of nature, also known as ecological balance, is a theory that proposes that ecological systems are usually in a stable equilibrium or homeostasis, which is to say that a small change (the size of a particular population, for example) will be corrected by some negative feedback that will bring the parameter back to its original "point of balance" with the rest of the system.
This research led to the development of concepts such as catastrophe theory; a branch of bifurcation theory in dynamical systems. In ecology the idea of systems with multiple regimes, domains of attraction called alternative stable states , only arose in the late '60s based upon the first reflections on the meaning of stability in ecosystems by ...
Coexistence theory explains the stable coexistence of species as an interaction between two opposing forces: fitness differences between species, which should drive the best-adapted species to exclude others within a particular ecological niche, and stabilizing mechanisms, which maintains diversity via niche differentiation.
An evolutionarily stable state is a dynamic property of a population that returns to using a strategy, or mix of strategies, if it is perturbed from that initial state. It is part of population genetics, dynamical system, or evolutionary game theory. This is now called convergent stability. [11]
According to a widespread narrative, the ideas of a holistic ecological community were introduced by plant ecologist Frederic Clements in 1916, and countered by Henry Gleason in 1917, when he proposed the individualistic/open community concept (in applications to plants). [1] However, this seems to be wrong in at least two essential respects:
Homeostasis, a state of equilibrium used to describe organisms; Mechanical equilibrium, a state in which all particles in a system are at rest, and total force on each particle is permanently zero; Balance of nature, a theory in ecological science; Stability theory, a theory in mathematics; Mertens-stable equilibrium in game theory