An event-oriented database of meteorological droughts in Europe based on spatio-temporal clustering.

Droughts evolve in space and time without following borders or pre-determined temporal constraints. Here, we present a new database of drought events built with a three-dimensional density-based clustering algorithm. The chosen approach is able to identify and characterize the spatio-temporal evolution of drought events, and it was tuned with a supervised approach against a set of past global droughts characterized independently by multiple drought experts.

A new global database of meteorological drought events from 1951 to 2016.

Study Region: This study has three spatial scales: global (0.5°), macro-regional, and country scale. The database of drought events has specific entries for each macro-region and country.

Fragmentation and thresholds in hydrological flow-based ecosystem services.

Loss and fragmentation of natural land cover due to expansion of agricultural areas is a global issue. These changes alter the configuration and composition of the landscape, particularly affecting those ecosystem services (benefits people receive from ecosystems) that depend on interactions between landscape components. Hydrological mitigation describes the bundle of ecosystem services provided by landscape features such as woodland that interrupt the flow of runoff to rivers.

How will climate change pathways and mitigation options alter incidence of vector-borne diseases? A framework for leishmaniasis in South and Meso-America.

The enormous global burden of vector-borne diseases disproportionately affects poor people in tropical, developing countries. Changes in vector-borne disease impacts are often linked to human modification of ecosystems as well as climate change. For tropical ecosystems, the health impacts of future environmental and developmental policy depend on how vector-borne disease risks trade off against other ecosystem services across heterogeneous landscapes.

Comparing strengths and weaknesses of three ecosystem services modelling tools in a diverse UK river catchment.

Ecosystem services modelling tools can help land managers and policy makers evaluate the impacts of alternative management options or changes in land use on the delivery of ecosystem services. As the variety and complexity of these tools increases, there is a need for comparative studies across a range of settings, allowing users to make an informed choice. Using examples of provisioning and regulating services (water supply, carbon storage and nutrient retention), we compare three spatially explicit tools - LUCI (Land Utilisation and Capability Indicator), ARIES (Artificial Intelligence for Ecosystem Services) and InVEST (Integrated Valuation of Ecosystem Services and Tradeoffs).