Spatial connectivity and distribution of landscape type in the natural secondary forests of eastern mountainous region,northeast China——a case study of Mao'ershan region in Heilongjiang Province

Mao'ershan region is representative in the natural secondary forested region of the eastern mountainous region, northeast China. The landscape nearest neighbor index and landscape connectivity index were calculated with ARC/INFO software for Mao'ershan region. The spatial distribution of the landscape of the region was analyzed. The results showed that the landscape connectivity index of non-woodland was significantly higher than that of woodland. The landscape connectivity index of natural forest was nearly equal to zero, which means its fragmentation degree is high. The nearest neighbor index of plantation was lower than that of natural forest and non-forestland. Among the man-made forests, the distance index of the coniferous mixed plantation is the lowest, and its pattern is nearly glomeration. The landscape pattern of natural forest presented nearly random distribution. Among non-forest land, the distance index of cut blank was the lowest, and its pattern was also nearly glomeration. Keywords Landscape type - Landscape pattern - Nearest neighbor index - Landscape connectivity index - Natural secondary forest - Northeast China CLC number S759.92 Document code A Foundation item: This paper was supported by the Key Project of State Department of Science Technology (2002BA515B040).Biography: LI SHu-juan (1977), female. Lecture in Ocean University of China, Qingdao 266003, P. R. China.Responsible editor: Zhu Hong

Classification system and structure analysis of marine cultural landscapes of China

Marine cultural landscapes are an important part of cultural landscapes,as a new kind of heritage.With reference to the classification of cultural landscapes,a three-level classification system,composed of the marine cultural landscape type,the marine cultural landscape subtype and the marine cultural landscape model was constructed in this study,based on the spatial and regional characteristics of marine history and culture.By the analysis of the effects of natural and humanity factors on the formation of marine cultural landscapes,the system structure of the marine cultural landscapes was divided into three major parts:the physical foundation,the marked material and the recessive material.

Spatiotemporal Patterns and Dynamics of Species Richness and Abundance of Woody Plant Functional Groups in a Tropical Forest Landscape of Hainan Island,South China

Tropical forests are among the most species-diverse ecosystems on Earth. Their structures and ecological functions are complex to understand. Functional group is defined as a group of species that play similar roles in an ecosystem. The functional group approach has been regarded as an effective way of linking the compositions of complex ecosystems with their ecological functions. To understand the variation of functional groups in species-rich ecosystems after disturbance, the present study investigated the spatial pattern and temporal dynamics of woody plants in a typically fragmented natural forest landscape of Hainan Island in South China. The study area was classified into eight landscape types based on vegetation type, disturbance manner and the time of recovery. The woody plant species were aggregated into seven functional groups based on the growth form, successional status and plant size. The results gained from the present study showed that all functional groups, except for the emergent and canopy tree species, were present in all eight landscape types. Each landscape type had different numbers of dominant functional groups. There are similar species richness and stem abundance structure among functional groups between mid-successional clear cut lowland rainforest and old growth tropical coniferous forest. This similarity exists in selective logged lowland rainforest and old-growth lowland rainforest, as well as among landscape types of montane rainforest. The functional groups with the same successional status had similar patterns of species richness and stem abundance ratios among different landscape types. The variation patterns of functional groups along the successional stages in terms of species richness and stem abundance among the tropical lowland rainforest landscape types were more similar to each other than those in the tropical montane rainforest landscape types. This study provides further support for the competition-colonization tradeoff and successional niche theory as opposed to models of neutrality and ecological equivalence.

Perception of pleasure in the urban running environment with street view images and running routes

The urban environment affects human behavior and health.Most studies on the feelings of street spaces have not considered a specific kind of realistic scene,such as running.To overcome this limitation,we explored the relationship between the urban environment and the pleasure of running.We collected 8260 street view images from 153 running routes in Beijing and invited more than 400 volunteers of different genders and ages to rate their sense of pleasure in street view images of the urban running environment through an online survey.Then,the proportion of visual elements in street images was extracted based on semantic segmentation,and the landscape was divided.Finally,a linear mixed model was used to predict the pleasure scores of different gender and age groups for different landscapes.The results show significant differences in the pleasure scores for different landscapes and age groups.Middle-aged people’s sense of pleasure was lower than that of the young and the elderly.More greenery was associated with a higher pleasure score,while the proportion of urban elements such as buildings was negatively correlated with the pleasure score.The results indicate that running in a natural landscape is pleasurable and beneficial for mental health.