3 April 2024

09:00 – 09:45

Amphi 3

Eric Harvey

Eric Harvey is a professor in the Department of Environmental Sciences at the Université du Québec à Trois-Rivières and holds the Canada Research Chair in Ecosystem Exchange. He is also a regular researcher at the Centre de recherche sur les interactions bassin versants – écosystèmes aquatiques (RIVE), the Centre de la science de la biodiversité du Québec (CSBQ), and the Groupe de recherche interuniversitaire en limnologie (GRIL). Trained as an ecologist, his research focuses on the notion of interactions, and therefore energy exchange, between species, communities and ecosystems. He seeks to understand how human disturbances influence biodiversity and ecosystem functioning. To this end, he uses a meta-ecosystemic perspective to consider the spatial organization of human activities, so as to maximize various ecological functions such as biodiversity conservation and the maintenance of ecosystem services.

Do ecological systems exchange energy?

In recent years, the classic model of the ecosystem as a self-sufficient, closed ecological unit has broken down, giving way to a more integrated, dynamic vision: the meta-ecosystem. Through active or passive energy movements, ecosystems sometimes exchange large quantities of energy, thus influencing resource distribution at both landscape and planetary scales. In a context of global change, the transformation of these exchanges could have major consequences for ecosystem stability, biodiversity and numerous ecosystem services. The meta-ecosystemic perspective leads us to reflect on how our world is connected via energy exchanges, and on the place of humans in this interconnected web formed by the landscapes in which we all live.