CHANS-Net: The International Network of Research on Coupled Human and Natural Systems

• CNH: Coupled Natural-Human Systems and Emerging Infectious Diseases

  Published on March 9, 2011
  Previous research suggests that infectious disease outbreaks are associated with environmental changes such as urbanization, agricultural change, and natural habitat alterations that occur as societies evolve. Studying the role of societal develop...

• Sustainability solutions need the power of networks

  Published on February 21, 2011
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• It’s time to take a unified approach toward measuring sustainability

  Published on February 21, 2011
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• "Telecoupling” explains why it’s a small (and fast) world, after all

  Published on February 21, 2011
  An early introduction to framework to help scientists more systematically understand connections and feedbacks between different places.

• A Well-Founded Fear of Climate Extremes? Tracing the Footprint of Environmental Migrants

  Published on February 3, 2011
  The goal of the subject research is to explore if, where and when data layers align to identify a footprint of environmental migrants. The approved research prospectus very specifically aims to create the world’s first global historic database on env...

• Dynamics of coupled human and natural systems: Spatial land use changes and ecological effects of mega-urbanization (EcoDynamics)

  Published on February 3, 2011
  The existing fragmented knowledge of the relationships between the mega-urban development, land use/land cover and ecosystem services has been insufficient for policy makers and scientific community. It had been difficult to realistically instigate l...

• The Challenge of Predicting Future Urban Water Demand: A System Dynamics Modeling Approach

  Published on February 3, 2011
  Previous research investigating urban residential water demand has either employed social science methods to examine human attitudes and behaviors or statistical models to explain the impacts of climate and other biophysical processes. The lack of in...

• Valuing the climate benefits from informal waste recycling in Bogotá, Colombia

  Published on February 3, 2011
  How waste is managed – whether as a nuisance to be disposed, or as a resource to be reused – has the potential to either contribute to or help mitigate climate change, an urgent global challenge that threatens human security and the stability of our ...

• Social capital and private forests: the role of personal networks in environmental decision-making

  Published on February 3, 2011
  Most forestland in the U.S. is in private ownership, consequently a variety of ecosystem services available to society are dependent on sustainable land management decisions by individual landowners. Landowner decision-making is a complex process and...

• The Dynamics and Sustainability of Hunting: Landscape-scale Management Implications for Amazonia

  Published on February 3, 2011
  Hunting is widely acknowledged to be unsustainable throughout the tropics, with many species becoming locally extinct where they are hunted. One of the many challenges to making hunting sustainable is the need to design cost-effective and widely usab...

• How Environmental Conditions Determine the Effect of an Alternative Income Program on Resource Extraction

  Published on February 3, 2011
  Alternative incomes have been proposed as an integrated conservation and development strategy that can be used to reduce natural resource extraction while improving or maintaining welfare. The success of alternative income programs; however, depends ...

• “Including Humans”: Practitioners’ views on the roles of social science in ecosystem-based management

  Published on February 3, 2011
  There is growing recognition for the need to integrate social sciences in marine conservation. Ecosystem-Based Management (EBM) is an integrative framework that explicitly mandates the integration of social and natural sciences. In the past decade, E...

• Creating a Global Network for Freshwater: Phase I, Developing Websites to Share Fresh Water Databases between Research Institutions in Latin America and the U.S.A.

  Published on February 3, 2011
  As part of a long-range plan to develop an active global network of institutions, organizations, and researchers working on issues related to fresh water, this project will develop a web-based platform designed to facilitate collaboration between Lat...

• Poyang Lake Ecology Study

  Published on February 3, 2011
  The Poyang Lake Basin in Jiangxi Province is one of the most important wintering areas for migratory waterbirds in Asia, with 98% percent of the global population of Siberian Cranes, 50% of White-naped Cranes, 50% of Swan Geese, and tens of thousands...

• Coupled Natural-Human Systems and Emerging Infectious Diseases: Anthropogenic environmental change and avian influenza in Vietnam

  Published on February 3, 2011
  As part of the coupled natural-human (CNH) system, humans are exposed to infectious diseases from each other and other animals. Previous research suggests that disease outbreaks are associated with environmental changes such as urbanization, agricult...

• Interactive Changes of Ecosystems and Societies on the Mongolian Plateau:

  Published on February 3, 2011
  The semi-arid region of the NEESPI domain on the Mongolian plateau lies within the jurisdictions of two governments, with similar geographical settings but contrasting socioeconomic systems - Inner Mongolia (IM) of China and Mongolia (MG).

• Sustainability in Communal Socio-Ecological Systems (SUCSES)

  Published on February 3, 2011
  This project aims to better understand the dynamic interactions between humans and the environment in rural South Africa. This will enable an assessment of the opportunities and constraints for sustainability in communal socio-ecological systems unde...

• Assessing Integrated Ecological Effects of land use change based on Ecosystem Services

  Published on February 3, 2011
  Land use / land cover change (LUCC) is gaining recognitions as one of the key components and driving forces of global environmental change. Ecological effect of LUCC is regarded as the very reason for the importance of LUCC to global environmental ch...

• Landscape Design Guidelines for Mitigating Human Rick of Exposure to Lone Star Tick-Associated Pathogens

  Published on February 3, 2011
  SUMMARY Recent research suggests that the sustainable management of healthy ecosystems may yield an important, previously under-recognized ecosystem service in the form of buffering humans against exposure to emerging vector-borne diseases. Studies f...

• The Pesticide Paradox: The Political Ecology of Vegetables and Global Food Regulation in Costa Rica

  Published on February 3, 2011
  This project examines pesticide use and residues in the context of Caribbean Basin non-traditional agricultural exports (NTAEs) and national market integration. It is based on field studies in Northern Cartago and the Ujarrás Valley, Costa Rica. Quan...