Encyclopaedic Dictionary of Environmental Change

The Encyclopaedic Dictionary of Environmental Change covers changes affecting the Earth over geological, intermediate and short timescales, including pre-Quaternary, Quaternary, Holocene, historical and current environmental changes. Recent climatic change is a major focus but other topics covered in detail relate to natural and human-induced changes to the lithosphere, hydrosphere, cryosphere and biosphere. Concepts, theories and issues relating to environmental change are included, as are the diverse sources of evidence of environmental change, the local, regional and global effects of environmental change from the poles to the tropics, and the approaches and techniques used for reconstructing, dating, monitoring, modelling and predicting change. This involves an interdisciplinary approach extending from the natural environmental sciences into relevant areas of the physical, earth, biological, archaeological and social sciences. The dictionary emphasises the science of environmental change but its social implications are not neglected. Entries range in level from short review articles of around 1,000 words which provide an up-to-date introduction to major topics, to concise one or two sentence definitions of terms likely to be encountered in this field.