Ecology Team Receives $6 Million for World’s Future

Utah State University biology professor Jim MacMahon has spent his entire professional life educating people about ecological changes and the effects they have on the human race. Now he, along with a team of scientists representing the American Institute of Biological Sciences, has been charged with answering some of the most important ecological questions confronting society.

 

The team received a $6 million grant to form the National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON), a major new initiative of the National Science Foundation (NSF). Once established, the network will allow scientists to tackle, from local to continental scales, important ecological questions confronting society. Topics researched by the network will include invasive species, infectious disease, biogeochemical cycling, land use change, biodiversity, global climate change, hydroecology and other emerging issues of national importance.

 

“This is our future and NEON is one of the biggest things to happen to ecology in the United States,” said MacMahon. “Everything NEON is involved in will have an impact on the human race and everyone from kindergarten through death should care about this stuff.”

 

Billions of dollars are spent in agriculture each year to try to combat invasive species of weeds in crops, according to MacMahon. Infectious diseases, such as the West Nile Virus, affect people and animals every year, and construction around the world on open lands is affecting the entire balance of the ecosystem, in turn contributing to global climate change.

 

NEON will establish a series of monitoring systems, covering the entire expanse of United States, to provide the research platform to track dynamics in many areas affecting or influencing the study of ecology. It will also provide the means to archive biological specimens and records for scientific analysis in the face of future technological and analytical developments, said MacMahon. MacMahon has organized the Intermountain Regional Observatory Network (IRON), one of the proposed monitoring systems within NEON.

 

Over the next two years, MacMahon and the entire NEON team will create science, infrastructure and education plans that will be presented to NSF. MacMahon is the co-chair of the science team and a member of the overall senior management team directing this program.

 

Those helping in the creation of NEON include representatives from the University of California Los Angeles, the University of Indiana, the University of Kansas, the University of Montana, the University of New Mexico, the University of San Diego, the University of Virginia, the University of Washington and the American Institute of Biological Sciences.With the plans completed, NEON Inc., a limited liability corporation, will become a reality in 2006 and the research and data collection can begin. Once in place, NEON will receive millions of dollars more from NSF to run the operation and carry out the research.

 

“NEON will involve thousands of scientists from around the country,” said MacMahon.

 

The program will eventually produce data that the Environmental Protection Agency may consult when making rules or that the U.S. Congress may refer to when making laws, MacMahon said.

 

“We want to reach out and engage a whole new generation of people about these complex issues,” said MacMahon. “And we know that NEON is just the way to do it.”

 

NEON will be housed in Washington D.C., and NSF will be a full partner in the project. The initiative will not be associated with any one university or program, allowing all scientists to feel welcome.

 

For more information about NEON or IRON visit the Web sites.

 

Writer: Maren Cartwright (435) 797-1355, maren.cartwright@usu.edu