The exclusive role of natural ecosystems is a key factor in the maintenance of the biospheric equilibrium. The current global crisis is largely caused by their dramatic decline by 43% in the past hundred years. Ignoring the immutable laws and limitations which determine the existence of all living things in the biosphere could lead humanity to an ecological catastrophe. This book presents the ecological, demographic, economic and socio-psychological manifestations of the global crisis and outlines the immutable laws and limitations which determine the existence of all living things in the biosphere.

The authors are eminently qualified to write about the problems associated with the global crisis and consider the causes behind humanity's conflict with its environment. V. Danilov-Danilian, Associate of the Russian Academy of Sciences and Russia's former Minister of the Environment, and K. Losev, professor at Moscow State university, are leading Russian ecologists and I. Reyf is a journalist who specializes in ecology and global development. Dr. Danilov-Danilian works on the economics of nature management, economic and mathematical model building, sustainable development theory and ecology. Dr Losev is the chief researcher and head of the division of the VINITI. All the authors have published numerous papers, articles and books on such subjects as glaciology, hydrology, environment studies, global change and sustainable development.

Arthur J. Cracknell: In the mid 1970s Prof. Cracknell started to become involved in remote sensing (Earth Observation) work, a field that was then in its infancy. The idea that led him to start remote sensing work in the former Physics Department at Dundee University was to provide a link between the generators of satellite data and the environmental scientists and engineers who would like to use the data. This work on the processing and interpretation of remote sensing data developed by Prof. Cracknell expanded enormously over a period of about 25 years and led to the publication by him and his co-authors of over 200 research papers and about 20 or so books on the subject. The books range from an introductory textbook on the subject, which is about to go into its second edition, to monographs and edited conference and summer school proceedings.

Prof. Vladimir F. Krapivin published numerous papers and a number of books relevant to environmental and global changes studies. Among the latter are:'Ecoinformatics Methods' (with I.I. Potapov), 2002, Moscow (in Russian).'Modelling the Global Carbon Cycle' (with K.Ya. Kondratyev), 2004, Moscow (in Russian).'Global Change of the Environment: Ecoinformatics' (with K.Ya. Kondratyev), St. Petersburg (in Russian).'Perspectives of Civilization Development: Multidimensional Analysis' (with K.Ya. Kondratyev and V.P. Savinikh), 2003, Moscow (in Russian).'Global Environmental Change: Modelling and Monitoring' (with K.Ya. Kondratyev and G.W. Phillips), Springer, 2002, Germany;'Global Carbon Cycle and Climate Change' (with K.Ya. Kondratyev and C.A. Varotsos), Springer/Praxis, 2003, U.K.;'Global Ecodynamics: a Multidimensional Analysis' (with K.Ya. Kondratyev, V.P. Savinikh, and C.A. Varotsos), 2004, Springer/Praxis, U.K.'Natural Disasters as Interactive Components of Global Ecodynamics' (with K.Ya. Kondratyev and C.A. Varotsos);'Atmospheric Aerosol Properties: Formation, Processes and Impacts' (with K.Ya. Kondratyev, L.S. Ivlev and C.A. Varotsos).

1. The seminal nature of the work of Academician Kirill Yakovlech Kondratyev;- 2- Academician Kirill Kondratyev and the IPCC: his opposition to the Kyoto Protocol;- 3. The earth radiation budget - twenty years later (1985 - 2005);- 4. Aerosol and atmospheric electricity;- 5. Remote sensing of terrestrial chlorophyll content;- 6. Regarding greenhouse explosion;- 7. Model-bases method for the assessment of global change in a nature/scoiety system;- 8. Self-learning statistical short-term climate predictive model for Europe; 9. Theory of series of exponents and its applications for analysis of radiation processes;- 10. Forecast of biosphere dynamics using small-scales models; 11. Air temperature change at the White Sea shores and Islands in nineteenth and twentieth centuries;-12. Climatic characteristics of the temperature, humidity and wind velocity in the atmospheric boundary layer over western Siberia;- 13. Ecological safety and risks of the carbohydrates transportation in the Baltic Sea;- 14. New directions in biophysical ecology;- 15. The Earth as an open ecosystem;- 16. The problems of the sustainable development of ecological-ecnonomic systems;- 17. Sustainable developments problems in the context of global ecoinformatics;- 18. "Sustainability - no hope!" or "Sustainability - no hope?"