Editors

About the Editor

Christine Fürst is since 2016 professor for Sustainable Landscape Development at Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg, Germany. She graduated as forest scientest at Ludwig-Maximilian University Munich (1998) and did afterwards the state exam at the Bavarian Forest Administration (2000). She obtained her PhD in 2010 in soil sciences at Dresden University of Technology and did her habilitation with venia legendi in “natural resource management” 2013 at University of Bonn. Christine´s special areas of interest are modelling of social-ecological systems and assessing impacts of future changes based on ecosystem services. She developed since 2007 an own modelling software, GISCAME, which is used for exploring sustainability futures based on participatory and probability-based scenarios. Her regional research focus is mainly in the Global South (Africa, Latin-America). Christine was lead author in the regional assessment in Europe-Central Asia in the Intergovernmental Panel for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services and chaired IALE International from 2015 – 2019. She has published almost 200 papers, book chapters and books of which almost 100 are ISI listed and peer-reviewed.

Cristian Echeverría is a full professor at the Faculty of Forest Sciences, University of Concepcion, Chile and Director of Landscape Ecology Lab and co-director of Foresta Nativa Initiative. He has been promoting the science of landscape ecology since he obtained his Ph.D. at the University of Cambridge, U. K. in 2005. He has been Vice-president for International Association for Landscape Ecology (IALE) between 2019 and 2021, the co-founder and president for IALE-Chile 2016-2019, co-founder and member of Iberoamerican and Caribbean Society of Ecological Restoration (SIACRE), and member of Society for Ecological Restoration (SER). In 2016, he was invited to be a member of IUCN’s Species Survival Commission Tree Specialist. His research mainly focuses on evaluating and implementing approaches on landscape sustainability science. He has conducted multiple  studies on conservation science and has assessed the impacts of land use change on multiple ecosystem services and forest biodiversity. Since 1998 he has worked on ecological restoration of degraded forest ecosystems in south-central Chile. In the last decade, he has been working on developing approaches for landscape restoration through spatially explict modelling techniques, systematic planning, and ecosystem services assessment. 

Henry Bulley is a Professor of Geography and GIScience at Borough of Manhattan Community College, The City University of New York. Dr. Bulley’s academic background is in GIScience comprising Geographic Information Systems (GIS) and Earth Observation Satellite Remote Sensing, Machine learning, landscape ecology, watersheds, and inland water assessments.  Dr Bulley’s research interest is in understanding the interactions between human activity (land use dynamics) and the natural environment, especially water resources, with a focus on sustainable development - we can only manage what we understand, and we cannot understand a resource if we do not know the extent and structure of that resource.  This includes the integration of geospatial science) and machine learning techniques to characterize landscape change in watersheds and water resource dynamics.  Some of his current research work include, assessing Land Use and Land Cover Change (LULCC) dynamics in the New York City (NYC) water supply watersheds, with the view of understanding the driving forces and their impact on water ecosystems services, including safe drinking water quality for NYC residents. 

Being a native of Ghana in West Africa, Dr. Bulley has immense interest in facilitating the adoption of Geospatial Science & Technology and Landscape Ecology principles for assessing ecosystems services to support sustainable development in African countries.  He has championed this goal as Vice-President of the International Association for Landscape Ecology – responsible for Africa.  Dr. Bulley has also received Carnegie African Diaspora Fellowship Program awards in 2016 and 2019 to support his research and outreach work in Africa. This includes a Community Flood Mapping Activity in Bwaise and Kalerwe, Uganda, and a Side Event on AfriGEOSS: Strengthening partnerships with African Diaspora on Earth Observations at the 2017 GEO-XIV Plenary. Dr, Bulley is currently engaged in a collaborative a 3-year Landscape Ecology Summer School for graduate students and early career scholars in Sub-Saharan Africa, as a capacity building venture.