We conceived the idea for this book after teaching a graduate seminar on 'Habitat Complexity' at The University of South Florida. Discussions during the seminar led us to conclude that similar goals were to be found in studies of the topic that spanned the breadth of ecological research. Yet, the exact meaning of 'habitat structure', and the way in which it was measured, seemed to differ widely among subdisciplines. Our own research, which involves several sorts of ecology, convinced us that the differences among subdisciplines were indeed real ones, and that they did inhibit communica tion. We decided that interchange of ideas among researchers working in marine ecology, plant-animal interactions, physiological ecology, and other more-or-less independent fields would be worthwhile, in that it might lead to useful generalizations about 'habitat structure'. To foster this interchange of ideas. we organized a symposium to attract researchers working with a wide variety of organisms living in many habitats, but united in their interest in the topic of 'habitat structure'. The symposium was held at The University of South Florida's Chinsegut Hill Conference Center, in May. 1988. We asked participants to think about 'habitat structure' in new ways; to synthesize important, but fragmented, information; and. perhaps. to consider ways of translating ideas across systems. The chapters contained in this book reflect the participants' attempts to do so. The book is divided into four parts, by major themes that we have found useful categorizations.

The present book is divided into several parts. An introductory chapter serves to make the reader aware of the diversity of the subject of habitat selection in birds. Many if the various aspects of habitat selection introduced in the first chapter are developed in subsequent chapters, and thus it serves to some extent as an overview of the subject and as a "lead-in" to subsequent work.

Handbook of Mammalian Vocalization is designed as a broad and comprehensive, but well-balanced book, written from the neuroscience point of view in the broad sense of this term. This well-illustrated Handbook pays particular attention to systematically organized details but also to the explanatory style of the text and internal cohesiveness of the content, so the successive chapters gradually develop a consistent story without losing the inherent complexity. Studies from many species are included, however rodents dominate, as most of the brain investigations were done on these species. The leading idea of the Handbook is that vocalizations evolved as highly adaptive specific signals, which are selectively picked up by the brain. The brain serves as a receptor and behavioural amplifier. Brain systems will be described, which allow vocal signals rapidly changing the entire state of the organism and trigger vital biological responses, usually also with accompanying emission of vocalizations. Integrative brain functions leading to vocal outcome will be described, along with the vocalization generators and motor output to larynx and other supportive motor subsystems. The last sections of the Handbook explains bioacoustic structure of vocalizations, present understanding of information coding, and origins of the complex semiotic/ semantic content of vocalizations in social mammals. The Handbook is a major source of information for professionals from many fields, with a neuroscience approach as a common denominator. The handbook provides consistent and unified understanding of all major aspects of vocalization in a monographic manner, and at the same time, gives an encyclopaedic overview of major topics associated with vocalization from molecular/ cellular level to behavior and cognitive processing. It is written in a strictly scientific way but clear enough to serve not only for specialized researchers in different fields of neuroscience but also for academic teachers of neuroscience, including behavioural neuroscience, affective neuroscience, clinical neuroscience, neuroethology, biopsychology, neurolingusitics, speech pathology, and other related fields, and also for research fellows, graduate and other advanced students, who widely need such a source publication. - The first comprehensive handbook on what we know about vocalization in Mammalians - Carefully edited, the handbook provides an integrated overview of the area - International list of highly regarded contributors, including Jaak Pankseep (Washington State University), David McFarland (Oxford), John D. Newman (NIH ? Unit on Developmental Neuroethology), Gerd Poeggel (Leipzig), Shiba Keisuke (Chiba City, Japan), and others, tightly edited by a single, well regarded editor who has edited a special issue in Behavioral Brain Research on the topic before

Aquatic habitats supply a wide range of vital ecosystem benefits to cities and their inhabitants. The unsustainable use of aquatic habitats, including inadequate urban water management itself, however, tends to alter and reduce their biodiversity and therewith diminish their ability to provide clean water, protect us from waterborne diseases and po