Alexander Buyantuev

Research Interests

• Landscape Ecology
• Urbanization and Urban Ecology
• Phenology
• Grassland ecosystems
• Remote Sensing
• Land Use/Cover change

Alexander Buyantuev joined the department in Fall 2013 after a short postdoctoral in the University of California - Riverside, and a 4-year assignment in the Sino-US Center for Conservation, Energy and Sustainability Science (SUCCESS) housed by Inner Mongolia University in Hohhot, China. Born in Leningrad, USSR, he grew up in Eastern Siberia in the vicinity of Lake Baikal, one of the world’s natural wonders. He received his B.S. and M.S. (1988) in Geography from Irkutsk State University in Russia and M.S. (2002) in Natural Resources Management from the University of Arizona. He holds a Ph.D. in Geography (1993) from the Russian Academy of Sciences, and Ph.D. in Plant Biology (2008) from Arizona State University. During his earlier carrier he worked in the Institute of Geography in Irkutsk, Russia, and also taught courses in Cartography and GIS in Irkutsk State University.

Dr. Buyantuev’s current research interests had been shaped greatly during his extended stay in the American Southwest, in particular through his deep involvement with the Central Arizona – Phoenix Long Term Ecological Research (CAPTER) project funded by NSF. While in China, he conducted his own urban ecological research with the support from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC).

He is most interested in the interactions between spatial patterns and ecological processes on multiple spatial scales from the experimental plot to the regional landscape. Spatial patterns include fine- to broad-scale variations in climatic, soil, and other biophysical conditions as well as land use and land cover pattern in a geographic area. Specific ecological processes he has been studying include vegetation (landscape) phenology and primary productivity.

His research on urban ecosystem dynamics is directed towards understanding trajectories of land use and land cover in growing urban areas and the role of vegetation on urban microclimates and ecosystem services production. He also believes landscape ecology can be instrumental in developing a spatially explicit, multi-scaled, and cross-disciplinary framework for integrating environmental, economic, and social components of urban regions. He actively publishes his results in a number of ecological and geographical journals and book chapters and reviews manuscripts for and. Dr. Buyantuev teaches introductory and advanced courses in remote sensing and landscape ecology.