Editors

About the Editor

Lawrence (Lars) R. Walker – Lars studies plant ecology with an emphasis on primary plant succession, or community assembly following disturbances so severe that little or no soil or plants are left behind.  His tools include field observations, field and greenhouse experiments, and conceptual models.  His interest in succession has led him to disturbance ecology because disturbances are the triggers that initiate community development; to soil ecology because of the intimate interplay between developing plants and soils; and to restoration, which he sees as the human manipulation of the successional process.  His work therefore integrates many disciplines while focusing on the ecological process of succession.  He also helped to build connections between fields of study, such as restoration and succession, aquatic and terrestrial succession, or spatial and temporal ecology.  Lars received his Ph.D. in Plant Ecology from the University of Alaska, Fairbanks, did a post-doctoral fellowship at Stanford University, and has held faculty positions over the last 30 years at the University of Puerto Rico, Río Piedras, and the University of Nevada Las Vegas.  He has published nine books on a variety of ecological topics and enjoys assisting colleagues in developing their book-length writing projects and students in developing their scientific writing skills.tal risks. For the past two decades, he has focused on incorporating spatially-explicit landscape perspectives to achieve integrated holistic risk assessments that can be used to inform environmental management decision-making. Related interests are in rehabilitating disturbed lands, using ecosystem services endpoints to expand the scope of analyses in risk assessments, and working to improve approaches to sustainability.