Buried viable seed banks are a fundamental aspect of seed plant biology. They play a key role in the conservation and restoration of plant communities and the response of plants to changing land use and climate. There is almost no area of plant ecology in which seed banks are not implicated. Despite several recent reviews of the ecology of seed banks, there has previously been no single source of data on seed persistence in individual species. This volume, which compiles the available data from the nineteenth century up to the end of 1993, provides this source for the 1189 members of the northwest European flora. The text describes the criteria for inclusion of data and discusses seed classification systems, the relative representation of different habitats, methods and taxa, and challenges for future research. Includes PC disc with database in searchable format.

This is the second edition of a multi-author book first published in 1992. It deals with all aspects of plant regeneration by seeds, including reproductive allocation, seed dispersal and predation, longevity, dormancy and germination. All chapters have been updated, and four new chapters added on seed size, seedling establishment, the role of gaps, and regeneration from seed after fire.

Global society in the 21st century is facing challenges of improving the quality of air, water, soil and the environment and maintaining the ecological balance. Environmental pollution, thus, has become a major global concern. The modern growth of industrialization, urbanization, modern agricultural development and energy generation has resulted in the indiscriminate exploitation of natural resources for fulfilling human desires and needs, which has contributed in disturbing the ecological balance on which the quality of our environment depends. Human beings, in the truest sense, are the product of their environment. The man-environment relationship indicates that pollution and deterioration of the environment have a social origin. The modern technological advancements in chemical processes/operations have generated new products, resulting in new pollutants in such abundant levels that they are above the self-cleaning capacity of the environment. One of the major issues in recent times is the threat tohuman lives due to the progressive deterioration of the environment from various sources. The impact of the pollutants on the environment will be significant when the accumulated pollutants load will exceed the carrying capacity of the receiving environment. Sustainable development envisages the use of natural resources, such as forests, land, water and fisheries, in a sustainable manner without causing changes in our natural world. The Rio de Janeiro-Earth Summit, held in Brazil in 1992, focused on sustainable development to encourage respect and concern for the use of natural resources in a sustainable manner for the protection of the environment. This book will be beneficial as a source of educational material to post-graduate research scholars, teachers and industrial personnel for maintaining the balance in the use of natural sources for sustainable development.

A concise, non-technical account of the structure and evolution of woodlands and forests, first published in 2007.

A concise but comprehensive introduction to the biology of coastal sand dunes. The emphasis in this book is on the organisms that dominate this predominantly marine environment, although pollution, conservation, management and experimental aspects are considered.

This is the first scholarly reference work to cover all the major scientific themes and facets of the subject of seeds. It outlines the latest fundamental biological knowledge about seeds, together with the principles of agricultural seed processing, storage and sowing, the food and industrial uses of seeds, and the roles of seeds in history, economies and cultures. With contributions from 110 expert authors worldwide, the editors have created 560 authoritative articles, illustrated with plentiful tables, figures, black-and-white and color photographs, suggested further reading matter and 670 supplementary definitions. The contents are alphabetically arranged and cross-referenced to connect related entries.

The new edition of Seeds contains new information on many topics discussed in the first edition, such as fruit/seed heteromorphism, breaking of physical dormancy and effects of inbreeding depression on germination. New topics have been added to each chapter, including dichotomous keys to types of seeds and kinds of dormancy; a hierarchical dormancy classification system; role of seed banks in restoration of plant communities; and seed germination in relation to parental effects, pollen competition, local adaption, climate change and karrikinolide in smoke from burning plants. The database for the world biogeography of seed dormancy has been expanded from 3,580 to about 13,600 species. New insights are presented on seed dormancy and germination ecology of species with specialized life cycles or habitat requirements such as orchids, parasitic, aquatics and halophytes. Information from various fields of science has been combined with seed dormancy data to increase our understanding of the evolutionary/phylogenetic origins and relationships of the various kinds of seed dormancy (and nondormancy) and the conditions under which each may have evolved. This comprehensive synthesis of information on the ecology, biogeography and evolution of seeds provides a thorough overview of whole-seed biology that will facilitate and help focus research efforts. - Most wide-ranging and thorough account of whole-seed dormancy available - Contains information on dormancy and germination of more than 14,000 species from all the continents – even the two angiosperm species native to the Antarctica continent - Includes a taxonomic index so researchers can quickly find information on their study organism(s) and - Provides a dichotomous key for the kinds of seed dormancy - Topics range from fossil evidence of seed dormancy to molecular biology of seed dormancy - Much attention is given to the evolution of kinds of seed dormancy - Includes chapters on the basics of how to do seed dormancy studies; on special groups of plants, for example orchids, parasites, aquatics, halophytes; and one chapter devoted to soil seed banks - Contains a revised, up-dated classification scheme of seed dormancy, including a formula for each kind of dormancy - Detailed attention is given to physiological dormancy, the most common kind of dormancy on earth

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This handbook in two volumes synthesises our knowledge about the ecology of Central Europe’s plant cover with its 7000-yr history of human impact, covering Germany, Poland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Luxembourg, Switzerland, Austria, Czech Republic and Slovakia. Based on a thorough literature review with 5500 cited references and nearly 1000 figures and tables, the two books review in 26 chapters all major natural and man-made vegetation types with their climatic and edaphic influences, the structure and dynamics of their communities, the ecophysiology of important plant species, and key aspects of ecosystem functioning. Volume I deals with forests and scrub vegetation and analyses the ecology of Central Europe’s tree flora, whilst Volume II is dedicated to the non-forest vegetation covering mires, grasslands, heaths, alpine habitats and urban vegetation. The consequences of over-use, pollution and recent climate change over the last century are explored and conservation issues addressed.