Abstract: It is of great significance to study the vulnerability of resource-based cities, which can implement a new urbanization strategy and promote the sustainable development of cities. Taking 25 mineral resource-based cities in the Loess Plateau, China as research objects, this study built an index system from four dimensions (economic, social, ecological environment, and resources). The vulnerability from 2000 to 2015 was evaluated to analyze the spatio-temporal pattern of vulnerability through grey correlation and geographic detector methods. Meanwhile, taking the population, the most mobile social resource, as the starting point, this paper analyzed the regional effect of the evolution of vulnerability of resource-based cities. It probed into the relationship between population factors and vulnerability of resource-based cities, which is helpful to reveal the internal mechanism of the population factors’response to vulnerability. The research findings are as follows: (1) The resource-based cities in the research area mainly exhibits medium and low vulnerability, and the overall trend was risen from 2000 to 2015. The polarization between cities was significant, but the imbalance was decreased. On the spatial pattern, the comprehensive vulnerability of resource- based cities had spatial heterogeneity in the Loess Plateau. Generally, it shows a decreasing pattern characteristic from southeast to northwest. Among them, the high vulnerable areas were concentrated in Loess Plateau gully region and the agricultural irrigation. (2) The vulnerability of resource- based cities in this region is characterized by the transformation of“ecological environment-economy+society-economy+ resources”. Among them, the economic-social vulnerability of mature-type and the economic-resources vulnerability of decline- type cities’ problem should be emphasized. In addition, the social vulnerability and ecological vulnerability of most cities had improved, while the resource vulnerability had increased significantly in the east and south. For the dimension of economic vulnerability, the range of change in the eastern and southern regions was relatively small. (3) The population response degree of comprehensive vulnerability was decreased. From the response of population aging, the total social dependency ratio and proportion of floating population were characterized by stages. The response of the proportion of urban population was found to be the strongest. The population of cities with low vulnerability expanded rapidly, while cities with high vulnerability, such as Baiyin and Weinan, faced population contraction. (4) The population response of sub- dimensional vulnerability presented dimensional differences, while the economic and social vulnerability was observed to be consistent. The total social dependency ratio was the key explanatory factor. In the ecological environment vulnerability, the proportion of floating population had a strong explanatory power and increased significantly, while the proportion of urban population had the highest degree of response in the resource vulnerability.

Key words: mineral resource-based city, vulnerability, population response, Loess Plateau