Global Analysis of Environmental Attributes of Ecosystems
This master's thesis aimed to investigate the influence of climatic and edaphic environmental attributes on the formation of native vegetation types and their respective ecosystems. Using global geographic databases, statistical analyses were conducted to assess how these attributes contribute to the occurrence of vegetation types. Based on these relationships, the potential distribution of native vegetation types were mapped under a hypothesis of no human interference. The results contribute to understanding the fundamental relationships between biotic and abiotic factors components of ecosystems with the support of the latest technological advancements of spatial data and computing. Energy provision from the sun, together with water availability patterns, were the most influential abiotic attributes to explain differences in the spatial distribution of vegetation types, while soil attributes had lesser influence.