| Summary: | To unravel the mechanisms behind the complex spatial patterns that dominate in nature is a key intellectual challenge of ecology. While ecologists have a long tradition of considering spatial components of ecological processes, this line of research is now poised to help us understand how species respond to dynamic landscape heterogeneity. The field of spatial ecology, a subject that has emerged from the disciplines of ecology, biostatistics and mathematical biology, is rising to the challenge, using novel concepts and powerful analytical tools. Here we discuss important issues showing why space should become routinely considered in the analyses of ecological phenomena, and present key analytical methods and quantitative frameworks used in spatial ecology. We show how current statistical phenomenological studies and mathematical modeling of ecological mechanisms are converging on research goals and in use of new analytical methods.
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