Exit time as a measure of ecological resilience

Ecological resilience is the magnitude of the largest perturbation from which a system can still recover to its original state. However, a transition into another state may often be invoked by a series of minor synergistic perturbations rather than a single big one. We show how resilience can be estimated in terms of average life expectancy, accounting for this natural regime of variability. We use time series to fit a model that captures the stochastic as well as the deterministic components. The model is then used to estimate the mean exit time from the basin of attraction. This approach offers a fresh angle to anticipating the chance of a critical transition at a time when high-resolution time series are becoming increasingly available.

Bibliographic Details

Main Authors:	Arani, Babak M.S., Carpenter, Stephen R., Lahti, Leo, Van Nes, Egbert H., Scheffer, Marten
Format:	Article/Letter to editor biblioteca
Language:	English
Subjects:	Life Science,
Online Access:	https://research.wur.nl/en/publications/exit-time-as-a-measure-of-ecological-resilience
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