Goals for Meeting

• Bring people together

• Suggest additional questions

• Define technological needs

• Make programmatic connections– Among research activities

– Between research & educational activities

– Between projects & Center activities

– Among agencies

> What Determines Species Diversity?

> How Will Big Pictures Emerge From a Sea of Biological Data?

Science, Vol 309, 1 July 2005

Two of Science’s Top 25 Questions

CREDIT: MICHAEL T. SHIPLEY

Some Other Big Questions• How does climate variability affect the abundance of

organisms?• How does climate change affect the distribution of

organisms?• Are the organisms in communities fungible, e.g.: how

stable are trophic webs at retaining their function?• How does biodiversity relate to the functioning of

ecosystems & what are the effects of spatial scale?• From all of the above, what are the hottest of the hot

spots for retaining maximum species diversity?• What are the best RS proxies for ecosystem diversity and

ecosystem health (e.g., NDVI, NPP, soil moisture, SST/SSH & location of fronts, vegetation structural complexity, rates of disturbance, rates of upwelling, etc.)? And what scales are necessary?

• Can we catch evolution in action by first correlating environmental changes at landscape/broader scales with genomic/proteomic changes?

Observations 1

• Frank M-K: Integrated watershed program involving NASA TE, LCLUC, Hydrology, Atmos. Chemistry, Ocean Biology, Biodiversity (MtnCoast)

• Dick W: Space Grant Extension Program

• Gary G: Research to Operations challenges

• Gary G: Data Access & Continuity, Communication to policy makers

Observations 2

• Jeff M: How to take full advantage of data providers, e.g.: GLCF, TRFIC, EAGLE-EYE

• Woody T: How to get the most out of operational decision support efforts, e.g.: SERVIR, ISFS, TOPS, VISTA, via linkage

• Woody T: Mapping to Modeling

• Woody T: Overall importance of climate

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