Network synergism: Emergence of positive relations in ecological systems

Progress in global ecological modelling

“…It has been widely accepted that earth surface modeling as one kind of methods for ecological modelling is a powerful tool for analyzing long-term decision problems (Forrester, 1982;Meadows, 1982;Iyer, 1988;Rotmans, 1990;Claudine and Alain, 2002;Sheffield et al, 2006;Larocque et al, 2006b;Solidoro et al, 2009). Owing partly to the increasing availability and speed of computers and to the rapidly expanding global database from various international cooperation programs (Boumans et al, 2002), many global models, starting in 1970, have been developed, such as the model for net primary productivity of the entire land surface of the Earth (Whittaker, 1970), the world model of the limits to growth (Forrester, 1971;Meadows et al, 1972), Ecopath with Ecosim (Polovina, 1984), terrestrial ecosystem model (Melillo et al, 1993), dynamic integrated climate-economy model (Nordhaus, 1993), the model for evaluating regional and global effects of GHG reduction policies (Manne et al, 1995), the Asian Pacific integrated model (Matsuoka et al, 1995), input-output network based model of ecosystems emerging (Fath and Patten, 1998), the model for water-global assessment and prognosis (Doell et al, 1999), general circulation models (Arakawa, 2000), the CENTURY model (Kirschbaum and Paul, 2002), the global unified metamodel of the biosphere (Boumans et al, 2002), the integrated model to assess the global environment (Kram and Stehfest, 2006), and the efficient numerical terrestrial scheme (Williamson et al, 2006). There appeared several simulation systems and tools for global ecological issues, such as earth simulator (Sato, 2004), digital earth system (IDEW, 2001;Grossner et al, 2008), planet simulator (Fraedrich et al, 2005a,b) and the global earth observation system of systems (GEOSS) …”

Time and space model of urban pollution migration: Economy-energy-environment nexus network

“…Negligible economic relationships between ''cancer villages" and adjacent cities in Huaihe River Basin (R ij < 0.5) (calculated data, see Table 1A in Appendix). [47,48], and network synergism [45,49] applying this method. The ecological network analysis research bifurcated into two selfsimilar, yet independent sub-areas, environ analysis and ascendancy analysis [50], both capable of quantifying direct and indirect ecological relationships within the ecosystem.…”

“…The methodology for network utility analysis is described in following literatures [45,49,53], which gives us a direct net flow matrix D = D(F) based on the steady net flows between compartments normalized by the compartmental throughflow such that…”

“…Thus, J(F) characterizes the ratio between the number of all positive and all negative relations. We consider J(F) as a goal function related to network mutualism in the energy system [49]. When J(F) > 1 mutualism occurs, indicating that the system overall has more positive sign-pair relations than negative ones.…”

Analyzing Ecological Systems Using Network Analysis

“…Turning now to the utility analysis, the net flow, utility matrix, D, can be used to determine quantitatively and qualitatively the relations between any two components in the network such as predation, mutualism, or competition (Patten 1991(Patten , 1992Fath & Patten 1998;Fath 2007). Entries in the direct utility matrix, D, or integral utility matrix, U, The elements of U provide the integral, system-determined relations.…”