Synthesis The quickly expanding literature on early warning signals for critical transitions in
ecosystems suggests that critical slowing down is a key phenomenon to measure the …

The realization that complex systems such as ecological communities can collapse or shift
regimes suddenly and without rapid external forcing poses a serious challenge to our …

In the vicinity of tipping points—or more precisely bifurcation points—ecosystems recover
slowly from small perturbations. Such slowness may be interpreted as a sign of low …

Complex systems can exhibit sudden transitions or regime shifts from one stable state to
another, typically referred to as critical transitions. It becomes a great challenge to identify a …

Most work on generic early warning signals for critical transitions focuses on indicators of the
phenomenon of critical slowing down that precedes a range of catastrophic bifurcation …

Big ecological changes often involve regime shifts in which a critical threshold is crossed.
Thresholds are often difficult to measure, and transgressions of thresholds come as …

The size of the basin of attraction in ecosystems with alternative stable states is often
referred to as “ecological resilience.” Ecosystems with a low ecological resilience may easily …

Generic early-warning signals such as increased autocorrelation and variance have been
demonstrated in time-series of systems with alternative stable states approaching a critical …

Anthropogenic activities are increasingly affecting ecosystems across the globe. Meanwhile,
empirical and theoretical evidence suggest that natural systems can exhibit abrupt collapses …

Theory and observation tell us that many complex systems exhibit tipping points—thresholds
involving an abrupt and irreversible transition to a contrasting dynamical regime. Such …