Eco- and Ground Bio-Engineering: The Use of Vegetation to Improve Slope Stability

In an era where climate change, natural catastrophes and land degradation are major issues, the conservation of soil and vegetation in mountainous or sloping regions has become an international priority. How to avoid substrate mass movementthroughlandslidesanderosionusingsustainableandecologicallysoundtechniquesisrapidlybecominga scienti?c domain where knowledge from many different ?elds is required. These proceedings bring together papers from geotechnical and civil engineers, biologists, ecologists and foresters, who discuss current problems in slope stabilityresearch,andhowtoaddressthoseproblemsusinggroundbio-andeco-engineeringtechniques.Aselection of papers were previously published in Special Editions of Plant and Soil (2005), volume 278, 1¿179, and in the Journal of Geotechnical and Geological Engineering (2006), volume 24, 427¿498. Ground bioengineering methods integrate civil engineering techniques with natural materials to obtain fast, effective and economic methods of protecting, restoring and maintaining the environment whereas eco-engineering has been de?ned as a long-term ecological strategy to manage a site with regard to natural or man-made hazards. Studies on slope instability, erosion, soil hydrology, mountain ecology, land use and restoration and how to mitigate theseproblemsusingvegetationarepresentedbybothscientistsandpractitioners.Papersencompassmanyaspectsof this multidisciplinary subject, including the mechanisms and modelling of root reinforcement and the development of decision support systems, areas where signi?cant advances have been made in recent years.