This volume provides an in-depth report and overview on research investigations that have been undertaken within Germany: 1. in a catchment and chain of lakes on the nothern coastal plain, 2. on an agricultural experimental farm in the Tertiary Hills of Bavaria, 3. in coastal lowland agro-landscapes and wetland habitats along the Polish border, 4. in spruce forests and a montane catchment in the Fichtelgebirge (Central Mountains), 5. in differently aged forest stands with succession in the Lüneburger Heide, and 6. in the Ammer River catchment in the alpine foothills of Southern Bavaria. Despite the myriad a details and observed heterogeneity in process regulation found for different ecosystem types, striking commonality in themes as well as convergences in principles have been identified that contribute to a synthetic picture of function within Central European landscapes. Part VII of this volume ("Future Perspectives") focuses on those methodologies that appear to promote a synthesis of process understanding despite complexity, that help orient ecosystem research more strongly toward management needs, and that demonstrate how ecosystem approaches to landscape management can be implemented. A long-term goal of ecosystem science must be to achieve a scientifically based compromise between economic science must be to achieve a scientifically land and an ecologically based care and treatment of landscapes that includes esthetics, use for relaxation and recreation purposes, and nature conversation, e.g., to develop methods over the long term for managing resources so that all of mankind's needs are provided in an acceptable fashion. The frontiers in ecosystem science include the strengthening of interdisciplinary ties in the natural sciences, the transferring of ecosystem knowledge across spatial and temporal scales, and the inclusion of athropogenic effects and human behavior into ecosystem, landscape, and regional models. Success in these efforts will mean that we can define and quantify sustainability in a manner acceptable to different interest groups, that we can build new forums for communication between ecosystem scientists and a broad spectrum of society, and that we can educate a new generation of environmental professionals so that they will be equipped to face the challenges of resource management in the 21st century.
