Looking forward through the past: identification of 50 priority research questions in palaeoecology

By A. Seddon, A. Mackay, Ambroise G. Baker, Harry John Betteley Birks, E. Breman, C. Buck, Erle C. Ellis, C. Froyd, J. Gill, L. Gillson and 58 more. 2014

254 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Priority question exercises are becoming an increasingly common tool to frame future agendas in conservation and ecological science. They are an effective way to identify research foci that advance the field and that also have high policy and conservation relevance. To date, there has been no coherent synthesis of key questions and priority research areas for palaeoecology, which combines biological, geochemical and molecular techniques in order to reconstruct past ecological and environmental systems on time‐scales from decades to millions of years. We adapted a well‐established methodology to identify 50 priority research questions in palaeoecology. Using a set of criteria designed to identify realistic and achievable research goals, we selected questions from a pool submitted by the international palaeoecology research community and relevant policy practitioners. The integration of online participation, both before and during the workshop, increased international engagement in question selection. The questions selected are structured around six themes: human–environment interactions in the Anthropocene; biodiversity, conservation and novel ecosystems; biodiversity over long time‐scales; ecosystem processes and biogeochemical cycling; comparing, combining and synthesizing information from multiple records; and new developments in palaeoecology. Future opportunities in palaeoecology are related to improved incorporation of uncertainty into reconstructions, an enhanced understanding of ecological and evolutionary dynamics and processes and the continued application of long‐term data for better‐informed landscape management. Synthesis. Palaeoecology is a vibrant and thriving discipline, and these 50 priority questions highlight its potential for addressing both pure (e.g. ecological and evolutionary, methodological) and applied (e.g. environmental and conservation) issues related to ecological science and global change.

Subfields: Atmospheric Science, Nature and Landscape Conservation

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/4d4aa1592525bb7d306da043077971b623123f9f

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Citations in the corpus

A roadmap for island biology: 50 fundamental questions after 50 years of The Theory of Island Biogeography (2017, background): “However, despite these efforts, it would be naive to regard our list as definitive and unbiased, as it inevitably reflects the interests of the particular group of voters who were contacted and participated in our survey (see e.g. Sutherland et al., 2013; Seddon et al., 2014).”
Does pollen-assemblage richness reflect floristic richness? A review of recent developments and future challenges (2016, unknown): “…spatial scales in palaeoecology and modern ecology (e.g. Whittaker 960 et al., 2001; Willis and Whittaker, 2002; Birks, 2012c; Barton et al., 2013; Seddon et al., 2014) 961 continue to create conceptual, methodological, and communication barriers between ecologists and 962 palaeoecologists…”