Marie-Josée Fortin - Böcker

Designed for researchers in ecology at all levels and career stages, from students and postdoctoral fellows to seasoned professionals, this third edition reflects the significant advances in quantitative analysis of the past decade. It provides updated examples and methods, with reduced emphasis on older techniques that have seen limited use in recent ecological literature. The authors cover new and emerging approaches, including Hierarchical Bayesian analysis and spatio-temporal methods. A key feature is the integration of ecological and statistical concepts, highlighting the critical role that this type of analysis plays in ecological understanding. The book provides up-to-date summaries of methodological advancements in spatial and spatio-temporal analysis, along with insights into future developments in areas such as spatial graphs, multi-level networks, and machine learning applications. It also offers practical examples and guidance to help researchers select, apply, and interpret the appropriate methods.

Network thinking and network analysis are rapidly expanding features of ecological research. Network analysis of ecological systems include representations and modelling of the interactions in an ecosystem, in which species or factors are joined by pairwise connections. This book provides an overview of ecological network analysis including generating processes, the relationship between structure and dynamic function, and statistics and models for these networks. Starting with a general introduction to the composition of networks and their characteristics, it includes details on such topics as measures of network complexity, applications of spectral graph theory, how best to include indirect species interactions, and multilayer, multiplex and multilevel networks. Graduate students and researchers who want to develop and understand ecological networks in their research will find this volume inspiring and helpful. Detailed guidance to those already working in network ecology but looking for advice is also included.