The disturbance and recovery of arctic terrestrial ecosystems was the subject of a NATO Advanced Workshop held at the Arctic Centr, University of Lapland, Rovaniemi, Finland, in September 1995. The object of the meeting was to bring together researchers on arctic vegetation who share a concern for the preservation of arctic ecosystems. A particular aim of the meeting was to involve as many Russian colleagues as possible and to encourage younger scientists currently active in the Russian Arctic to come to Rovaniemi and make first-hand contact with colleagues from other countries with a view to planning further collaboration. This volume of papers therefore contains papers both from many younger researchers as well as from those who have been active in arctic plant ecology for many years. Disturbance is no new feature in the arctic environment. The factors that create the arctic habitat include marked climatic oscillations, physical disturbance and fluctuations in herbivore populations. The combination of environmental stress and disturbance from habitat instability and the possibility of periods of intense grazing imposes a particularly testing blend of adverse conditions for plant survival. The physical nature of the terrain with constant soil movement through cryoperturbation and solifluction contributes to the fragility of arctic habitats. To this scenario we must add disturbance by man in the unending quest for yet more natural resources, whether they be animal, vegetable or mineral or merely the concept of environmental experience, as in tourism.

The disturbance and recovery of arctic terrestrial ecosystems was the subject of a NATO Advanced Workshop held at the Arctic Centr, University of Lapland, Rovaniemi, Finland, in September 1995. The object of the meeting was to bring together researchers on arctic vegetation who share a concern for the preservation of arctic ecosystems. A particular aim of the meeting was to involve as many Russian colleagues as possible and to encourage younger scientists currently active in the Russian Arctic to come to Rovaniemi and make first-hand contact with colleagues from other countries with a view to planning further collaboration. This volume of papers therefore contains papers both from many younger researchers as well as from those who have been active in arctic plant ecology for many years. Disturbance is no new feature in the arctic environment. The factors that create the arctic habitat include marked climatic oscillations, physical disturbance and fluctuations in herbivore populations. The combination of environmental stress and disturbance from habitat instability and the possibility of periods of intense grazing imposes a particularly testing blend of adverse conditions for plant survival. The physical nature of the terrain with constant soil movement through cryoperturbation and solifluction contributes to the fragility of arctic habitats. To this scenario we must add disturbance by man in the unending quest for yet more natural resources, whether they be animal, vegetable or mineral or merely the concept of environmental experience, as in tourism.

This book presents a wide-ranging introduction to the diatoms together with an illustrated description of over 250 genera. Diatoms are important as perhaps the commonest group of autotrophic plants on earth and are abundant in all waters and on soils and moist surfaces. The introduction describes the diatom cell in detail, the structure of the wall (often extremely beautiful in design), the cell contents and aspects of life cycle and cell division. The generic atlas section is the first account of diatom systematics since 1928 (Karsten in Engler and Prantl: Die Nauturlichen Pflanzenfamilien) and each generic description is accompanied by scanning electron micrographs to show the characteristic structure. Most of the latter have been prepared specially for this work from the authors' own collections. The Diatoms will be the standard reference work on the group for years to come and is an essential reference volume.

Australia celebrates one hundred years as a nation in 2001.

This book - part history, part travelogue, part memoir - tells the inspiring story of how a one-time British colony of convicts turned itself into a prosperous and confident country.

Through the eyes of ordinary people, Phillip Knightley describes Australia's journey, from federation and the trauma of the First World War, the desperate poverty of the Depression, with its attendant spectres of secret armies and near-civil war, the threat of invasion in the Second World War and the immigration that followed it, and the slow but steady decline in the relationship with Britain, the 'Mother Country', as Australia forged its own unique identity.