EFI RCN NEON Ecological Forecasting Challenge
The Ecological Forecasting Initiative
The NSF funded EFI Research Coordination Network (EFI-RCN) is hosting a NEON Ecological Forecast Challenge with the goal to create a community of practice that builds capacity for ecological forecasting by leveraging NEON data products. As a community, we are excited to learn more about the predictability of ecological processes by forecasting NEON data prior to its release. What modeling frameworks, mechanistic processes, and statistical approaches best capture community, population, and ecosystem dynamics?
These questions are answerable by a community generating a diverse array of forecasts. The Challenge is open to any individual or team that wants to submit forecasts and includes categories for different career stages. This program started in 2020, and will continue through at least 2024, with rotating challenges over the years that will span multiple research themes. The current research challenge themes include forecasts of terrestrial water and carbon fluxes, beetle abundance, tick population size, water temperature and dissolved oxygen, and canopy greenness. Individuals can submit forecasts for any or all themes!
All About EFI
From videos to wikis to FAQs, the EFI website is chock full of the information you'll need to learn more about ecological forecasting and join the challenge.
NEON Data
NEON data are used in all of the challenges. Explore what's available and think about what you might want to forecast!
NEON Field Sites
NEON intensively monitors 81 sites across a range of ecosystem types, providing ample opportunity to forecast across a wide array of gradients.
Video Resources
Learning How To Forecast
NEON and Ecological Forecasting
New To Forecasting?
Ecological forecasting is an emerging interdisciplinary research area that combines concepts, tools, and methods from ecology, statistics, computer science, the social and decision sciences, and the physical environmental sciences with the aim of simultaneously improving environmental decision making and improving our understanding of the predictability of natural systems. We've put together a series of videos explaining the fundamentals of ecological forecasting.
Learn About The Current Themes
Ongoing challenges, all of which use NEON data, include Beetle Abundance, Terrestrial Carbon & Water Fluxes, Water Temperature and Dissolved Oxygen, Tick Population Size, and Canopy Spring and Fall Phenology.
All About the Challenge
This extensive document on the EFI site gives details on each Challenge Theme, as well as sections with an example workflow, participation and submission instructions, FAQs, and video resources on how to participate.
NASA Satellite Data
Get MODIS, VIIRS, DayMet, and more, specifically clipped to NEON field sites, from the Oak Ridge National Laboratory DAAC.
For more information about the Forecasting Challenge, be sure to visit the EFI website. For questions about NEON data, send us a message through our Contact Us form.