Stand and Landscape Dynamics

In this section of the professorship, we aim to (1) better understand the key processes that are determining long-term (i.e., decadal to centennial and even millenial time scales) forest dynamics; and (2) to bridge the gap between fundamental research and application by providing decision support in practical forest management in the face of global climate change.

We thus evaluate the dynamics of forest stands and landscapes based on a combination of empirical data and rigorous dynamic modeling approaches. We are harnessing data from National Forest Inventories, the long-term plots of the Swiss Forest Reserve Network, Growth-And-Yield data and other sources to evaluate models of forest dynamics. In our view, dynamic models are an indispensable and integral component of the scientifc method.