This book provides an overview of the ecological indicators of landscape dynamics in the context of geographical landscape integration. Landscape dynamics depicts every change that occurs in the physical, biological, and cognitive assets of a landscape. To understand and interpret the complex physical, biological, and cognitive phenomena of landscapes, it is necessary to operate conceptually and practically on a broad range of spatial and temporal scales. Rapid land use changes have become a concern to environmentalists and planners because of their impacts on the natural ecosystem, which further determines socioeconomic dynamics. In this regard, the book discusses case studies that share new insights into how landscape patterns and processes impact small creatures, and how small creatures in turn influence landscape structure and composition.
In turn, the relevant aspects of land use and land cover dynamics are covered, and the multi-faceted relationship between the substrata and ecological community is highlighted. The book is unique in its focus on the application of spatial informatics such as automatic building extraction from high-resolution imagery; a soil resource inventory for meeting the challenges of land degradation; hydrological modeling; the temporal variation analysis of glacier area and the identification and mapping of glacial lakes; morphometric analysis of river basins; and the monitoring and modeling of urban sprawl, among other features.
Dr. Seema Sahdev is an associate professor in the Department of Geography at Kalindi College, University of Delhi. Dr. Sahdev completed her M.Phil. at the University of Delhi and her Ph.D. at Jamia Millia Islamia University, New Delhi. She had worked in several administrative posts of the College and organized awareness programmes related to disaster management for students and faculty members as well. She convened the International Conference on the Spatial Decision Support System for United Nations Sustainable Development Goals and the National Seminar on Environmental Ethics, Resource Depletion, and Sustainable Development. Dr. Sahdev has published a book as well as research papers in national and international journals including National Geographical Journal of India, Goa Geographers, and International Journal of Computer Science. She edited the book Environment and Sustainable Development: A Geographical Appraisal (Concept Publishing, 2018). Her research domain includes political geography, electoral geography, environmental geography, and disaster management
Dr. R.B. Singh is a professor of geography at the Delhi School of Economics, University of Delhi; the secretary general and treasurer of the International Geographical Union (IGU); the chair of Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR)–Central Food Technological Research Institute of the Government of India, and a member of the International Council for Science (ICSU) and the scientific committee Urban Health and Well-Being. He was awarded the prestigious Japan Society for the Promotion of Scientific Research Fellowship and has presented papers and chaired sessions in more than 40 countries. He has published 14 books, 35 edited research volumes, and more than 215 research papers. He has supervised 34 Ph.D. and 79 M.Phil. students. In 1988 the Unesco/the International Social Science Council awarded him research and study grants in social and human sciences.
Dr. Manish Kumar is an assistant professor in the Department of Geography at Kalindi College, University of Delhi. From January 2009 to December 2014, Dr. Kumar has also worked as lecturer in M.Sc. remote sensing and GIS course of Kumaun University, Nainital. Dr. Kumar has worked as a research associate in the UNDP project on “rurbanization,” making small town hubs of rural productivity, in a Delhi policy group. He is also a visiting faculty at SPA, Delhi. Dr. Kumar holds a Ph.D. from Kumaun University as well as a postgraduate diploma in remote sensing and GIS from the IIRS, Dehradun. He has published more than 25 research papers in various national and international Scopus-indexed journals. His special area of research interest includes the application of remote sensing and GIS in urban and regional planning, land use and land cover dynamics, climate change etc.
