ARC Research Network
Discovering the past and present to shape the future: networking
environmental sciences for understanding and managing Australian biodiversity
(Environmental Futures Network)
This network was a 5 year ARC funded program (2005-2010) aimed to bring together
specialists with a wide range of research interests, to pool their ideas
and expertise to allow us to detemine how to best describe Australia's current
biodiversity and the history leading up to this. Our geographical limit
is the Australian continent, and includes marine, freshwater and terrestrial
environments with a strong focus on using the past to explain the present.
The network was based around three main themes: The
impact on biodivesity of -
- global climate change, past and future
- geo-historical (non-climatic) processes
- the arrival and spread of humans
The Network aimed to interact directly with land managers to both inform
research directions and to impart useful information for management planning.
We believe this will lead to an internationally recongnised multi-disciplinary
approach to the major problems confronting both Australia and the world
in coming years.
This network is the result of the merger of four seed-funded
networks with the following titles:
- Understanding the Australian Ecosystem: integrating contemporary and
historical perspectives on the evolution, ecology and management of
Australia's living resources
- Innovative science for sustainable use of marine biodiversity goods
and services
- Sustainable Futures through understanding past human responses to
environmental change
- Networking environmental science to achieve integrated management
of Australian terrestrial biodiversity in an era of environmental change
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