BACKGROUND Early civilizations developed around seasonal river floodplains, and the
natural rhythm of rivers remains critical to humans today. We use streams and rivers to meet …

Riverine ecosystems are governed by patterns of temporal variation in river flows. This
dynamism will change due to climate change and the near-ubiquitous human control of river …

River management based solely on physical science has proven to be unsustainable and
unsuccessful, evidenced by the fact that the problems this approach intended to solve (eg …

Alterations to the natural flow regime affect the structure and function of rivers and wetlands
and contribute to loss of biodiversity worldwide. Although the effects of flow regulation have …

Across much of the industrialized world, rivers that were physically transformed and
ecologically ruined to facilitate industrial and agricultural development are now the focus of …

The alteration of river flow regimes by dams, weirs, and water extraction is a key impact of
humans on freshwater ecosystems and has occurred in rivers across all inhabited continents …

We illustrate the fundamental importance of fluctuations in natural water flows to the long-
term sustainability and productivity of riverine ecosystems and their riparian areas. Natural …

Obtaining a better knowledge of how flow variability affects lotic biota is of considerable
importance to stream and river management. We contend that processes at different …

Accounting for natural differences in flow variability among rivers, and understanding the
importance of this for the protection of freshwater biodiversity and maintenance of goods and …

Rivers have been diminished, simplified, and degraded globally by the concentration of
agriculture, transportation, and development in valley bottoms over decades and centuries …