How can system dependencies impact the functionality of date-related functions in PHP, and how can they be mitigated?

System dependencies can impact the functionality of date-related functions in PHP if the server's timezone settings are not configured correctly. This can lead to incorrect date calculations and display. To mitigate this issue, you can explicitly set the timezone in your PHP script using the `date_default_timezone_set()` function.

// Set the timezone to UTC
date_default_timezone_set('UTC');

// Now date-related functions will use the specified timezone
echo date('Y-m-d H:i:s'); // Outputs the current date and time in UTC