{"doi":"10.1038/35098000","title":"Catastrophic shifts in ecosystems","abstract":"All ecosystems are exposed to gradual changes in climate, nutrient loading, habitat fragmentation or biotic exploitation. Nature is usually assumed to respond to gradual change in a smooth way. However, studies on lakes, coral reefs, oceans, forests and arid lands have shown that smooth change can be interrupted by sudden drastic switches to a contrasting state. Although diverse events can trigger such shifts, recent studies show that a loss of resilience usually paves the way for a switch to an alternative state. This suggests that strategies for sustainable management of such ecosystems should focus on maintaining resilience.","journal":"Nature","year":2001,"id":12072,"datarank":13.303259241018198,"base_score":8.88447171813916,"endowment":8.88447171813916,"self_citation_contribution":1.3326707577208743,"citation_network_contribution":11.970588483297323,"self_endowment_contribution":1.3326707577208743,"citer_contribution":11.970588483297323,"corpus_percentile":85.6,"corpus_rank":2141,"citation_count":7218,"citer_count":159,"citers_with_citation_signal":159,"citers_with_endowment":159,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2001-10-01","authors":[{"id":56022,"name":"Jonathan A. Foley","orcid":null,"position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":35579,"name":"Carl Folke","orcid":"0000-0002-4050-3281","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":56019,"name":"Brian Walker","orcid":"0000-0002-9136-3055","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":35576,"name":"Stephen R. Carpenter","orcid":"0000-0001-8097-8700","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":96135,"name":"Brian R. Walker","orcid":"0000-0002-2416-1648","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":56005,"name":"Marten Scheffer","orcid":"0000-0002-2100-0312","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":61,"raw_metadata":{"citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-03-01T18:20:47.508186Z","pmid":null,"pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}