Assessing Urban Ecological Environment Protection

Dear Colleagues,

Urban green spaces and wetlands are vital components of urban ecological environment. Urban green space and wetland ecosystems serve important functions such as carbon sequestration, regional climate regulation, recreation, etc. These ecosystems have changed markedly due to rapid urban development (e.g., urban expansions and urban agglomeration) and global warming. However, the impacts of these two factors on the urban green space and wetland ecosystems are uncertain due to limits of the evaluated indices, methods and spatiotemporal scales. Moreover, the underlying mechanisms of these ecosystem changes remain poorly constrained in urban ecological science. These problems are urgent in improving the understandings of urban ecosystem dynamics and its driving mechanisms, and then optimizing the urban ecological restorations and constructions in a sustainable way.

This Special Issue aims to offer a platform for seeking new data, methods and theories to assess the impacts of rapid urban development and climate change on the urban green space and wetland ecosystems, and to reveal the underlying mechanisms of these ecosystem changes. These findings will expand the theories of urban ecological science and support optimizing functions of the urban green space and wetland ecosystems as well as urban planning to realize high-quality urban development.

In this Special Issue, original research articles and reviews are welcome which focus on assessing the impacts of rapid urban development and climate change on the urban green space and wetland ecosystems, and which clarify the processes and mechanisms of these ecosystem changes. Research areas may include (but are not limited to) the following:

• New data or methods or theories for assessing and understanding the impacts of rapid urban development and climate change on the urban green space ecosystem or wetland ecosystem at multiple spatiotemporal scales (e.g., years and seasons, neighborhoods and regions).
• Contribution analysis of rapid urban development and climate change to dynamics in the urban green space ecosystem or wetland ecosystem.
• Driving processes and mechanism explorations for changes in the urban green space ecosystem or wetland ecosystem.
• Methodologies and strategies for optimizing functions of the urban green space ecosystem or wetland ecosystem, e.g., through cost and benefit analysis and scenario analysis.
• Viewpoints and reviews on the impacts of rapid urban development and climate change on urban green space ecosystem or wetland ecosystem.

We look forward to receiving your contributions.

Dr. Biao Zeng
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Urban Science is an international peer-reviewed open access quarterly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 1600 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

• urban green space
• wetlands
• ecosystem services
• urban development