Systems ecology is the application of systems theory to the study of ecosystems; it studies the interaction between organisms and their abiotic environment through systems modeling. Systems ecology is holistic in its approach crossing both physical and biological sciences, but also economics and social science, to understand both ecosystems and coupled socioecological systems in an integrated fashion. Systems ecology as an approach can be defined by its use of systems modeling, energetics, emergence theory, nonequilibrium thermodynamics and feedback loops. On a methodological level, it often involves computer simulations in interpreting large amounts of data to visualize large-scale ecosystems such as earth’s global biophysical processes.
