Abstract
This perspective presents a new framework to improve ecological contributions to understanding how urban, rural, and wild attributes can co-occur and mix within specific locations, producing configurations that cannot be understood through binary contrasts. We focus on mixed conditions and the processes that sustain dynamic mosaics of mixed urban-rural sites. This framework complements others that avoid the urban-rural binary, and supports integrated social and ecological research across landscapes of mixture.
Data availability
No datasets were generated or analysed during the current study.
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Acknowledgements
We are grateful to Ruth DeFries for helpful comments on an early draft of the manuscript. Stephen Hamilton provided early insights and the initial design of Fig. 1. Joshua Ginsberg provided a helpful late draft review. The findings and conclusions in this publication are those of the authors and should not be construed to represent any official USDA or US Government determination or policy. This paper was funded by a planning grant, NSF CEBT SRS-RN 2115414, “The Continuum of Urbanity as an Organizing Concept to Promote Sustainability in the Mid-Hudson Region,” with additional support of the Baltimore Ecosystem Study through National Science Foundation DEB-1637661 and DEB-1855277. W.Z. was supported by the National Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 42225104); D.L.C. was supported by the National Science Foundation (Grant Nos. 1832016; 2224662 to the Central Arizona-Phoenix Long-Term Ecological Research Program. STAP was supported by the Science Innovation Fund of the Cary Institute. The original conception of the continuum of urbanity was supported by the Ernst Strüngmann Forum (27). The findings and conclusions in this publication are those of the authors and should not be construed to represent any official USDA or US Government determination or policy.
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Designed research: S.T.A.P., W.Z., J.M.G., D.L.C., W.D.H., C.B., and K.S. Performed research: S.T.A.P., W.Z., D.L.C., J.M.G., W.D.H., D.H.L., C.B., K.C.S., D.Z., L.N., S.L., R.F., C.T.S., E.M.C., R.U.M., D.M., and A.R.B. participated in meetings, discussions, and regional scoping that generated this paper. Wrote the paper: S.T.A.P., W.Z., D.L.C., J.M.G., W.D.H., D.H.L., C.B., K.C.S., D.Z., L.N., S.L., R.F., C.T.S., E.M.C., R.U.M., D.M., and A.R.B. provided or edited text; supplied and summarized literature; evaluated the case study materials, and each approved the final version.
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Pickett, S.T.A., Zhou, W., Childers, D.L. et al. The continuum of urbanity: a synthetic concept for research on urban-rural mixtures. npj Urban Sustain (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s42949-026-00347-8
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s42949-026-00347-8
