Plant Ecology provides a unique and up-to-date treatment of all aspects of the field, making it ideally suitable as a textbook and reference work for students, researchers and practitioners. More than 500 high-quality images and drawings, mostly in colour, aid the reader in visualizing and understanding numerous key topics. Its clear structure and straightforward style make it user friendly and particularly accessible for students. The integrity and authoritativeness of the information is guaranteed by an experienced author team. Whilst Plant Ecology is primarily aimed at graduate students of biology, post-graduate students and researchers in botany, geosciences and landscape ecology will also find this text invaluable as a reference work. In fact, everybody whose study or work touches on agriculture, forestry, land use, and landscape management will find this text a rich learning experience. Key Topics: - Molecular ecophysiology (stress physiology: light, temperature, oxygen deficiency, drought, salt, heavy metals, xenobiotica and biotic stress factors) - Autecology (whole plant ecology: thermal balance, water, nutrient, carbon relations) - Ecosystem ecology (plants as part of ecosystems, element cycles, biodiversity) - Synecology (development of vegetation in time and space, interactions between vegetation and the abiotic and biotic environment) - Global aspects of plant ecology (global change, global biogeochemical cycles, land use, international conventions, socio-economic interactions)