Ecosystem as self-organizing critical systems

The paper examines the following properties which are often associated with self-organizing critical systems: (1) Is the relationship between body size and abundance for species in ecosystem a power law? (2) Wilt the frequency with which observed changes exceeds a given change versus the change follow a power law? (3) Will the typical frequencies of 'avalanches' follow a power law? (4) Can the occurrences of 'avalanches' according to a well-examined ecosystem model be used to explain the underlying causality? As the examinations give the clear answer 'yes' to all four questions, and as many other properties of ecosystems also point towards ecosystems as self-organising critical systems, it seems possible to support the hypothesis, that ecosystems are self-organizing systems. (C) 1998 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.