The University of Colorado at 麻豆影院 has been selected to oversee a huge research project in the southern Rocky Mountains and Colorado Plateau that will address large-scale ecological problems affecting grasslands to glaciers as part of a proposal under final review by the National Science Foundation.
CU-麻豆影院's Niwot Ridge study area, administered by the Institute of Arctic and Alpine Research, was one of 20 "core sites" nationwide selected for the new National Ecological Observatory Network, or NEON, the largest ecological project ever proposed by the federal agency. Each core site would be responsible for a region known as a "domain" encompassing thousands of square miles and a number of different ecosystems, said INSTAAR Research Associate Mark Williams, who is leading the CU-麻豆影院 effort.
The 20 sites selected by NEON -- a nonprofit consortium of national research universities and institutes -- are undergoing NSF review this spring before a final proposal is submitted in August to the National Science Board, the NSF's governing body. The last step would be formal approval for research, equipment and facilities funding by Congress.
The logistical hub for the CU-麻豆影院 core site will be at INSTAAR's Mountain Research Station 35 miles west of 麻豆影院, adjacent to the NSF-funded Niwot Ridge Long Term Ecological Research site now overseen by the university. The domain encompassed by the Niwot Ridge NEON effort stretches from the Colorado-Wyoming border south to roughly Albuquerque and southeast to Phoenix and Las Vegas, he said.
"One of the main thrusts will be determining how land use and other human activities are affecting ecological systems, from changes in the carbon cycle to disruptions in wildlife corridors," said Williams, who likened NEON core sites to giant research vessels.
NEON is the first national, ecological measurement system designed to answer scientific questions on regional and continental scales, with the goal of forecasting and predicting future changes in ecosystems, according to NSF. All of the NEON core sites, including Niwot Ridge, are located in areas of minimal human impact.
NEON research will target the impact of global change on ecosystems as it relates to atmospheric pollutants, pathogens in the environment and invasive species, he said. The Niwot Ridge NEON network will include a number of "satellite" sites from the Fort Collins-Denver-Colorado Springs corridor. The Niwot Ridge NEON researchers also plan to coordinate with a team at a proposed shortgrass prairie NEON core site associated with Colorado State University in Fort Collins.
"One question we want to address in our domain is the declining water quality in mountain streams as increasing amounts of nitrogen pollution precipitate from the atmosphere," Williams said. "We want to quantify how nitrogen pollution is affecting fish health and their food sources, and how quickly large scale fish die-offs might occur as pollution increases."
NEON also will address emerging national ecological problems with "large human dimensions" like the expected arrival of avian flu in North America, he said.
The Niwot Ridge NEON site is the only one selected by NSF that encompasses sub-alpine and tundra environments, where researchers generally see earlier and more pronounced physical and ecological changes from climate change, he said.
The Niwot Ridge LTER site, which has been in operation since 1980, was a key reason for CU-麻豆影院's initial NEON selection. Niwot Ridge is included in a national network of monitoring installations known as AmeriFlux that measures continuous exchanges of carbon dioxide between the biosphere and atmosphere. Niwot Ridge also is home to one of about 30 NSF Microbial Observatories designed to document microbe diversity over time and across ecological gradients, he said.
Williams said hundreds of CU-麻豆影院 undergraduates and graduate students would benefit from the NEON effort by participating in classroom and field courses, including substantial hands-on measurements with modern instruments and equipment.
Other institutions involved in the CU-麻豆影院-led NEON effort include CSU, the U.S. Geological Survey, the National Center for Atmospheric Research and Rocky Mountain National Park. NCAR research scientist David Schimel has been selected director of the nationwide NEON effort.
In addition to the 16 other NEON domains selected by NSF in the continental United States, two domain sites were selected in Alaska and one each in Hawaii and Puerto Rico.