Fuente: Sustainability - Revista científica (MDPI) Sustainability, Vol. 18, Pages 5624: Enhancing Urban Sustainability Through Wetland Ecological Network Structural Connectivity: An Integrated MSPA–MCR–Circuit Theory Framework for Wuhan, China
Sustainability doi: 10.3390/su18115624
Authors:
Mengna Chen
Huiqiong Xia
Weijuan Wang
Nianteng Wang

Rapid urbanization has intensified wetland fragmentation and ecological connectivity degradation, threatening the structural stability and functional sustainability of urban wetland ecosystems. Constructing resilient wetland ecological networks is therefore essential for maintaining regional ecological security and supporting sustainable urban development. Taking Wuhan as a case study, multi-temporal land-use data from 2004, 2014, and 2024, together with land-use transition matrices, were used to analyze urban expansion and wetland landscape transformation. Morphological Spatial Pattern Analysis (MSPA), the Minimum Cumulative Resistance (MCR) model, and circuit theory were integrated to identify ecological sources, construct ecological corridors, and evaluate the structural connectivity of the wetland ecological network. Ecological source importance was quantified using the Probability of Connectivity (PC) and dPC indices. In addition, robustness analysis based on the sequential removal of high-dPC ecological source patches was conducted to assess network stability under disturbance scenarios. The results identified 20 core ecological source areas and 45 ecological corridors, forming a relatively interconnected wetland ecological network centered around major lake clusters and key ecological hubs. High-current corridors and pinch points were mainly distributed in ecologically sensitive transition zones and urban expansion boundaries. Robustness analysis showed that sequential removal of high-dPC ecological hubs resulted in continuous declines in EC(PC) and corridor number, while corridor length increased substantially. Although overall connectivity was maintained through alternative ecological pathways, ecological movement efficiency decreased significantly under disturbance scenarios, indicating increasing dispersal costs and reduced structural stability. These findings suggest that the wetland ecological network possesses moderate structural connectivity through pathway redundancy but remains highly dependent on several dominant ecological hubs. This study extends traditional static connectivity assessment by incorporating robustness and disturbance response analysis into wetland ecological network evaluation. The proposed framework provides scientific support for resilient wetland conservation, ecological restoration, and sustainable spatial planning in rapidly urbanizing metropolitan regions.