Contents: Preamble. 1. Climate change: cause and concern/Asish Ghosh. 2. Climate change: impacts, adaptation and mitigation/Sayan Bhattacharya and Aniruddha Mukhopadhyay. 3. Impact of climate change on geological system/Chittaranjan Bhattacharyya. 4. Coal mining and climate change: an environmental vista/Apurba Ratan Ghosh. 5. Understanding change in the glaciers of the Indian Himalayas/Divya Mohan and Shirish Sinha. 6. Predicted global forest changes: apprehensions and realities/Tapan Kr. Mishra. 7. Human-altered environment and plant community/Asok Kumar Mukherjee. 8. Impact of climate change on diversity and distribution of fungal community/Prakash Pradhan and Krishnendu Acharya. 9. Climate changes and crop protection: an overview/Ashim Chowdhury, Wasim Akhtar, Sujay Saha and Ruchi Garg. 10. Global climate change vis-a-vis agriculture and food security/Rathindra Narayan Basu. 11. Climate change and its impact on Antarctic life/Asok Kanti Sanyal. 12. Climate change and its impact on the distribution of birds in Southern Indian Ocean and Antarctica/K. Sivakumar and S. Sathyakumar. 13. Impact of climate change on soil and soil biota/Subrata Roy. 14. Climate change and its impact on Sundarban biosphere reserve/Pranabes Sanyal. 15. Climate change and its impact on wetland ecosystem/Tapan Saha. 16. Climate change and its impact on aquatic biodiversity/Ramakrishna and C. Raghunathan. 17. Climate change: impacts on species conservation/Dipankar Ghose. 18. The changing global climate and future of marine and inland fisheries/Anilava Kaviraj. 19. Impact of climate change on human physiology vis-a-vis human health/Somenath Roy. 20. Climate change and human health/Krishnangshu Ray. 21. Impact of climate change on microbial community with special emphasis on cholera/Banwarilal Sarkar. 22. Some thoughts on environment and arthropod borne diseases in India/Amiya Kumar Hati. 23. Birds in a warming world: a review/Subhendu Mazumdar and Goutam Kr. Saha. 24. Impact of micro and macro level climate change on animal behaviour/Pulak Lahiri. 25. Climate change and biodiversity: Indian initiatives/Ramakrishna. Index.

Climate change is a hard reality and changing weather patterns, retreating glaciers, polar ice melt, sea level rise, increased severity and occurrence of natural disasters like flood, super cyclone, drought, changes in hydrological cycles, crisis in freshwater and drinking water resources, uncertainty in cereal output, increasing vector borne diseases, changing migration pattern and flowering time, are just some of the consequences already being experienced by us. Fragile and delicate ecosystems like coral reefs and mangroves are extremely sensitive to the slightest variation in climate. In developing countries like India, climate change may contribute an additional burden on ecological and socioeconomic systems associated with rapid urbanization, industrialization and economic development. Climate Change : Man and Environment is an attempt to compile various aspects of climate change, its causes and impacts on different facets of life and environment. Mass awareness and technical understanding of the cause and impacts of climate change is necessary to adopt necessary mitigation/adaptation strategies to ensure out own existence. The present compilation is enriched with 25 lead articles contributed by the authorities in their respective fields and is meant to serve as an important resource material for students (both undergraduate and postgraduate), researchers, academicians, naturalists, environmental and wildlife activists as well as for common people having concern for nature and environment. (jacket)