It would be interesting to know some burning issues and climate change research areas in mountain ecosystems that are currently under-researched. It can be any aspects of vulnerability or adaptation and can consider any elements like social, economic, environmental as well as psychological.
sir landslide hazard is a nice topic, like you can use cartosat 1 or another satellite data in the topic in climate change.
Hi Mahat...........the plant animal interactions to effects of climate change should be more detailed. Studies should be done taken phenological response of plants, pollinator interactions into account as well as changing biochemical responses between symbionts and other species. As far as detalled studies are needed, species specific studies are essential..............for example delayed flowering of Rhododendrons for which associated pollinating populations are responsible..............movement of tree line to upper limits and changing behavioral ecology of associated fauna.....................Both field work and lab studies are elaborately needed. You require a botanist, zoologist, ecologist, geologist, soil scientist, sociologist as well as people with good knowledge of surroundings.........It also do require proper funding, research potential and timing...............
Hello Tek dai,
Although understanding of geographic range shifts of many species in response to global climate change is expanding steadily, little is known about the Himalayan fauna, which in particular is affected by relatively faster warming rates than other parts of the world.
Therefore, intensive studies focusing on the biological and ecological traits of the species should be seen as a priority. For detail please see Shah et al. 2012. Range shifts of a relict Himalayan dragonfly in the Hindu Kush Himalayan region under climate change scenarios. International Journal of Odonatology.
The impact of climate variability at different spatial scales to develop a comprehensive understanding of the ecosystem functions and services.
Most interesting issues to follow .as an impact of drastic climatic variations are...
1. The changes that happen on Himalayan region(so other regions experiencing climatic onslaught) are fauna and flora....... some rare , new and interesting species are likely to surface from centuries old dormant stage (sadly some existing species may vanish altogether ).
2.Socioeconomic changes and stress related effects on habitats
3.Eruption of new or resistant strains of microorganisms leading to delayed or no effect of existing drugs (epidemics and endemics) posing newer medical challenges.
Thank you friends for wonderful responses ranging from physical aspects to spatial differences, animal-plant-climate interactions and socio-economic coverage. Looking forward to some more responses.
Dear Tek, are you aware of case studies on the effects of climate change on Andean vertebrates?
It depends a bit on the researchers background; as social scientist I feel much more needs to be done in clearly understand what creates social vulnerabilities and how people in the past have responded to disaster risks, which of these responses are still important ways to strengthen communities and which ones are not suitable any longer as the threads have become to big and/or societies have change too much and lost cohesion in the meanwhile.
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