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Nature | Review

日本語要約

Approaching a state shift in Earth’s biosphere

Journal name:
Nature
Volume:
486,
Pages:
52–58
Date published:
DOI:
doi:10.1038/nature11018
Published online

Localized ecological systems are known to shift abruptly and irreversibly from one state to another when they are forced across critical thresholds. Here we review evidence that the global ecosystem as a whole can react in the same way and is approaching a planetary-scale critical transition as a result of human influence. The plausibility of a planetary-scale ‘tipping point’ highlights the need to improve biological forecasting by detecting early warning signs of critical transitions on global as well as local scales, and by detecting feedbacks that promote such transitions. It is also necessary to address root causes of how humans are forcing biological changes.

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  1. Drivers of a potential planetary-scale critical transition.
    Figure 1: Drivers of a potential planetary-scale critical transition.

    a, Humans locally transform and fragment landscapes. b, Adjacent areas still harbouring natural landscapes undergo indirect changes. c, Anthropogenic local state shifts accumulate to transform a high percentage of Earth’s surface drastically; brown colouring indicates the approximately 40% of terrestrial ecosystems that have now been transformed to agricultural landscapes, as explained in ref. 34. d, Global-scale forcings emerge from accumulated local human impacts, for example dead zones in the oceans from run-off of agricultural pollutants. e, Changes in atmospheric and ocean chemistry from the release of greenhouse gases as fossil fuels are burned. f–h, Global-scale forcings emerge to cause ecological changes even in areas that are far from human population concentrations. f, Beetle-killed conifer forests (brown trees) triggered by seasonal changes in temperature observed over the past five decades. g, Reservoirs of biodiversity, such as tropical rainforests, are projected to lose many species as global climate change causes local changes in temperature and precipitation, exacerbating other threats already causing abnormally high extinction rates. In the case of amphibians, this threat is the human-facilitated spread of chytrid fungus. h, Glaciers on Mount Kilimanjaro, which remained large throughout the past 11,000 yr, are now melting quickly, a global trend that in many parts of the world threatens the water supplies of major population centres. As increasing human populations directly transform more and more of Earth’s surface, such changes driven by emergent global-scale forcings increase drastically, in turn causing state shifts in ecosystems that are not directly used by people. Photo credits: E.A.H. and A.D.B. (a–c, e–h); NASA (d).

  2. Quantifying land use as one method of anticipating a planetary state shift.
    Figure 2: Quantifying land use as one method of anticipating a planetary state shift.

    The trajectory of the green line represents a fold bifurcation with hysteresis12. At each time point, light green represents the fraction of Earth’s land that probably has dynamics within the limits characteristic of the past 11,000 yr. Dark green indicates the fraction of terrestrial ecosystems that have unarguably undergone drastic state changes; these are minimum values because they count only agricultural and urban lands. The percentages of such transformed lands in 2011 come from refs 1, 34, 35, and when divided by 7,000,000,000 (the present global human population) yield a value of approximately 2.27 acres (0.92 ha) of transformed land for each person. That value was used to estimate the amount of transformed land that probably existed in the years 1800, 1900 and 1950, and which would exist in 2025 and 2045 assuming conservative population growth and that resource use does not become any more efficient. Population estimates are from refs 31–33. An estimate of 0.68 transformed acres (0.28 ha) per capita (approximately that for India today) was used for the year 1700, assuming a lesser effect on the global landscape before the industrial revolution. Question marks emphasize that at present we still do not know how much land would have to be directly transformed by humans before a planetary state shift was imminent, but landscape-scale studies and theory suggest that the critical threshold may lie between 50 and 90% (although it could be even lower owing to synergies between emergent global forcings). See the main text for further explanation. Billion, 109.

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Author information

Affiliations

  1. Department of Integrative Biology, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA

    • Anthony D. Barnosky,
    • Charles Marshall &
    • Nicholas Matzke

  2. Museum of Paleontology, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA

    • Anthony D. Barnosky &
    • Charles Marshall

  3. Museum of Vertebrate Zoology, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA

    • Anthony D. Barnosky

  4. Department of Biology, Stanford University, Stanford, California 94305, USA

    • Elizabeth A. Hadly

  5. Integrative Ecology Group, Estación Biológica de Doñana, CSIC, Calle Américo Vespucio s/n, E-41092 Sevilla, Spain

    • Jordi Bascompte

  6. TRU NORTH Labs, Berkeley, California 94705, USA

    • Eric L. Berlow

  7. Department of Biology, The University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, New Mexico 87131, USA

    • James H. Brown

  8. Department of Geosciences and Geography and Finnish Museum of Natural History, PO Box 64, University of Helsinki, FI-00014 Helsinki, Finland

    • Mikael Fortelius

  9. Department of Environmental Science, Policy, and Management, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA

    • Wayne M. Getz,
    • John Harte,
    • Rosemary Gillespie &
    • Justin Kitzes

  10. Energy and Resources Group, University of California, Berkeley, California 94720, USA

    • John Harte

  11. Department of Environmental Science and Policy, University of California, One Shields Avenue, Davis, California 95616, USA

    • Alan Hastings

  12. Departamento de Ecología, Facultad de Ciencias Biológicas, Pontificia Universidad Católica de Chile, Alameda 340, Santiago, Chile

    • Pablo A. Marquet

  13. Instituto de Ecología y Biodiversidad, Casilla 653, Santiago, Chile

    • Pablo A. Marquet

  14. The Santa Fe Institute, 1399 Hyde Park Road, Santa Fe, New Mexico 87501, USA

    • Pablo A. Marquet

  15. Facultad de Ciencias Biologicas, Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile, Alameda 340, Santiago, Chile

    • Pablo A. Marquet

  16. Pacific Ecoinformatics and Computational Ecology Lab, 1604 McGee Avenue, Berkeley, California 94703, USA

    • Neo D. Martinez

  17. Department of Biological Sciences, Simon Fraser University, 8888 University Drive, Burnaby, British Columbia V5A 1S6, Canada

    • Arne Mooers

  18. California Academy of Sciences, 55 Music Concourse Drive, San Francisco, California 94118, USA

    • Peter Roopnarine

  19. Department of Geology, University of California, One Shields Avenue, Davis, California 95616, USA

    • Geerat Vermeij

  20. Department of Geography, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin 53706, USA

    • John W. Williams

  21. Department of Biophysics and Biochemistry, University of California, San Francisco, California 94102, USA

    • David P. Mindell

  22. Department of Conservation Biology, Estación Biológica de Doñana, CSIC, Calle Américo Vespucio s/n, E-41092 Sevilla, Spain

    • Eloy Revilla

  23. Center for Conservation and Sustainable Development, Missouri Botanical Garden, 4344 Shaw Boulevard, Saint Louis, Missouri 63110, USA

    • Adam B. Smith

Contributions

All authors participated in the workshop and discussions that resulted in this paper, and provided key insights from their respective research specialties. A.D.B. and E.A.H. were the lead writers and synthesizers. J.B., E.L.B., J.H.B., M.F., W.M.G., J.H., A.H., A.M., P.A.M, N.D.M., P.R., G.V. and J.W.W. compiled data and/or figures and wrote parts of the text. R.G., J.K., C.M., N.M., D.P.M., E.R. and A.B.S. contributed to finalizing the text.

Competing financial interests

The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Comments

  1. Report this comment #43987

    Vic Kley said:

    This seems a powerful collection of work the authors have contributed, unfortunately it has the potential for misuse as all good things.

    Already inflammatory articles in environmental blogs and online zines are heralding this article as a doomsday prediction calling for half page headlines in the Times and change or ELSE.

    The authors' conclusions are modest, clear and careful, they don't overstep. I would caution Anthony Barnosky to expect to hear a great deal about this subject and to have a more forceful restatement of the conclusion ready to set both friend and foe straight as to the intended meaning and result of the work.

    On the off chance the authors may have already crafted such a re-casting of the conclusions I hope they will post it here for everyone to appreciate.

  2. Report this comment #44109

    Kevin Matthews said:

    This is a gorgeous synthesis and summary of a vast range of ideas and information, at many simultaneous levels of consideration, presented with a sweeping lucidity.

    The integrated picture presented, and its practical implications, are breathtakingly profound.

    I hope, in service to a humanity that desperately needs to grasp this, that the publishers will considermaking this unique review paper accessible outside the subscription firewall. This deserves to be read by everyone capable of it.

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