Introduction
Environmental Structure And Function: Earth System is a component of Encyclopedia of Earth and Atmospheric Sciences in the global Encyclopedia of Life Support Systems (EOLSS), which is an integrated compendium of twenty one Encyclopedias.
This volume contains several chapters, each of size 5000-30000 words, with perspectives, applications and extensive illustrations. It carries state-of-the-art knowledge in the fields of Environmental Structure and Function: Earth Systems and is aimed, by virtue of the several applications, at the following five major target audiences: University and College Students, Educators, Professional Practitioners, Research Personnel and Policy Analysts, Managers, and Decision Makers and NGOs.
Editor(s) Biography
Nikita Glazovsky, was born in 1946 in Alma Ata (Kazakhstan). A citizen of Russia, he is one of leading Russian geographers, a world-famous scientist, a specialist on environmental protection, sustainable development, use of natural resources, and geochemistry of landscapes. He is the author of over 200 published works and monographs. He has served as Deputy Minister of Ecology of the Russian Federation. He was also Chairman of the Council of Ecological Foundation of the Russian Federation, a member of the Higher Ecological Council, and a member of the Advisory Committee, Institute of World Resources (Washington, D.C., USA). He is now a Regional Director of the International Program “Leadership for Environment and Development.” In 2000, he was elected Vice President of the International Geographical Union.
Nina A. Zaitseva, Dr.Sc., was born in August 1940 in Moscow (Soviet Union). In 1962, she graduated from the Lomonosov Moscow State University as a geographer-climatologist. A citizen of Russia, she is now one of the leading Russian scientists in the field of atmospheric physics, radiation processes, and upper-air techniques. For about thirty years she dealt with radiometersonde observations, which were organized on a special radiometersounding network throughout the territory of USSR, on weather ships, and in Antarctica. Her PhD (1971) and DSc. (2004) theses were devoted to study of spatial and temporal variability of terrestrial (long-wave) radiation in the free atmosphere based on the radiometer sounding method. She was an active participant of a number of large international experiments in the framework of the Global Atmosphere Research Program, and twice participated in Soviet Antarctic Expeditions. During 1976-1984, Nina Zaitseva was twice elected a member of the IAMAP (International Association of Meteorology and Atmospheric Physics) Radiation Commission. She participated with reports in several quadrennial International Radiation Symposia, and is very experienced in international co-operation. She is the author of over 100 published works, including a textbook on aerology and an English-Russian Dictionary of Meteorology (co-author).
From 1962 to 1997, she served as junior, then senior scientist and secretary in the Central Aerological Observatory of the Russian Federal Service of Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring. Since 1997, she has been leading scientist of the Department of Earth Sciences in Presidium of Russian Academy of Sciences.
