An ecosystem's resilience is a race between how often it's disturbed and how fast its biomass can regrow — richer ecosystems tend to recover faster.
biomass(t+1) = biomass(t) + growth*recovery - disturbance
- Grid resolution — landscape cells tracked for biomass and disturbance.
- Species richness — how many interacting species/functional groups occupy the landscape.
- Disturbance intensity — rate of disruptive events (fire, drought, harvest) hitting the landscape.
- Recovery rate — how quickly biomass regrows after a disturbance.
Ecosystems with higher species richness consistently show faster recovery from disturbance in long-term field studies — redundant species fill in for each other.