Impact

Explore how NEON impacts ecological research and education.

LENO tower from bottom looking toward top of forest canopy

Monitoring Biodiversity on a Global Scale

A recent paper in Environmental Research: Ecology explores the potential for using air- and spaceborne lidar to monitor biodiversity on a global scale. The study used NEON airborne laser scanning (ALS) data with NASA's Global Ecosystem Dynamics Investigation (GEDI) spaceborne lidar to validate a unique approach that uses "characteristic" forest structure to infer biodiversity for areas difficult to directly sample.

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Trees at MLBS

Diving Into the Future of Freshwater Forecasting

Can water quality be forecast just like the weather? For Dr. Quinn Thomas, that is the ultimate goal. He and fellow researchers tested a model for forecasting lake temperatures at six NEON lake sites. Their results were recently published in Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment. Thomas is also the Principal Investigator for the EFI-RCN NEON Forecasting Challenge, which seeks to create a community of ecological forecasters using NEON data to test forecasting models.

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A buoy on the CRAM lake site in the fall

Where Are Ground Beetle Populations at Risk?

A recent paper in Global Ecology and Biology, Habitat–trait interactions that control response to climate change: North American ground beetles, explores the connections between climate change, habitat types, and ground beetle traits. The study could help researchers model which ground beetle species may be at risk and the habitats needing protection to preserve them.

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Archive of tagged and identified beetles

Observatory Blog

Like to hear what the NEON community is working on? We publish about one new blog post per week.

All blog posts

Publications

Scientists and educators have published many professional papers using NEON data and resources. Check out our bibliography.

Papers and Publications

Newsroom

Check out our newsroom where you can subscribe to periodic newsletters, find where we've been in the news, and more.

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Share your research story!

Have you used NEON data, samples, or infrastructure? Please contact us about your research and we'd be happy to write a blog article featuring your work as well as add your papers to our publications list.

Martha Creek in the Fall