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The concept of ecological stability emerged in the first half of the 20th century. With the advancement of theoretical ecology in the 1970s, the usage of the term has expanded to a wide variety of scenarios. This overuse of the term has led to controversy over its definition and implementation. [3]
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 ...
Resistance is one of the major aspects of ecological stability.Volker Grimm and Christian Wissel identified 70 terms and 163 distinct definitions of the various aspects of ecological stability, but found that they could be reduced to three fundamental properties: "staying essentially unchanged", "returning to the reference state...after a temporary disturbance" and "persistence through time of ...
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.
The concept of resilience in ecological systems was first introduced by the Canadian ecologist C.S. Holling [7] in order to describe the persistence of natural systems in the face of changes in ecosystem variables due to natural or anthropogenic causes. Resilience has been defined in two ways in ecological literature:
Use of ecological networks makes it possible to analyze the effects of the network properties described above on the stability of an ecosystem. Ecosystem complexity was once thought to reduce stability by enabling the effects of disturbances, such as species loss or species invasion , to spread and amplify through the network.
Regime shifts are hard to reverse and in some cases irreversible. The regime shift concept shifts analytical attention away from linearity and predictability, towards reorganization and surprise. Thus, the regime shift concept offers a framework to explore the dynamics and causal explanations of non-linear change in nature and society.
As in most other sciences, mathematical models form the foundation of modern ecological theory. Phenomenological models: distill the functional and distributional shapes from observed patterns in the data, or researchers decide on functions and distribution that are flexible enough to match the patterns they or others (field or experimental ecologists) have found in the field or through ...