Brian Walker (ecologist)

Brian H. Walker is an internationally experienced scientist working on ecological sustainability and resilience in social-ecological systems.

Brian Walker began his scientific career in Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), where he developed an interest in ecosystem function and dynamics in tropical savannas and rangelands. He earned his PhD in Plant Ecology from the University of Saskatchewan, in Canada in 1968.

He was a Lecturer and Senior Lecturer at University of Rhodesia, Rhodesia from 1969 until 1975. After that he was a Professor at the University of the Witwatersrand, before moving to Australia in 1985. There he became Chief of the former CSIRO Division of Wildlife and Ecology (now CSIRO Sustainable Ecosystems) from 1985-1999.

He has also made significant contributions to global change science. Serving as the Chair of the Scientific Steering Committee of the IGBP core project on Global Change and Terrestrial Ecosystem, from 1990-1997 and Chair of the Board, Beijer International Institute of Ecological Economics, Swedish Academy of Sciences from 1999-2002.

He is now a Research Fellow with CSIRO Sustainable Ecosystems and is also Program Director and Chair of the Board of the Resilience Alliance, an international research group working on sustainability of social-ecological systems.

He is well know for his work on rangeland ecosystems. A key focus of his work is the significance of resilience (the capacity of a system to absorb disturbance and to undergo change while still retaining essentially the same function, structure, identity, and feedbacks) in the sustainability of ecosystems and social-ecological systems.

Brian Walker has co-authored two books, published over 160 scientific papers and edited and co-edited nine books. Including the 2006 book Resilience thinking: Sustaining ecosystems and people in a changing world.

His most cited papers include:
* 1992 "Biodiversity and ecological redundancy" "Conservation Biology" Vol 6 : 18-23.
* 1985 with W.T. Knoop "Interactions of woody and herbaceous vegetation in southern African savanna" in "Journal of Ecology" Vol 73 : 235-253.
* 1981 with D. Ludwig, C. S. Holling and R Peterman. "Stablity of semi-arid savanna grazing systems" "Journal of Ecology" Vol 69 : 473-498.
* 2001 with M. Scheffer, S.R. Carpenter, J. Foley, and C. Folke. "Catastrophic shifts in ecosystems" in "Nature" Vol 413 : 591-596.
* 1989 with M. Westoby I. Noy-Meir. "Opportunistic management for rangelands not at equilibrium. in "Journal of Range Management" Vol 42(4) : 266-274.

External links

* [http://www.beijer.kva.se/ Beijer Institute]
* [http://www.csiro.au/ CSIRO Webpage]
* [http://www.gcte.org/ GCTE Webpage]
* [http://www.resalliance.org/ Resilience Alliance]