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Sensing Forests Directly: The Power of Permanent Plots

The need to measure, monitor, and understand our living planet is greater than ever. Yet, while many technologies are applied to tackle this need, one developed in the 19th century is transforming tropical ecology. Permanent plots, in which forests are directly sensed tree-by-tree and species-by-spe...

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Detalles Bibliográficos
Autor principal: Phillips, Oliver L.
Formato: Online Artículo Texto
Lenguaje:English
Publicado: MDPI 2023
Materias:
Acceso en línea:https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10648163/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37960066
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/plants12213710
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author Phillips, Oliver L.
author_facet Phillips, Oliver L.
author_sort Phillips, Oliver L.
collection PubMed
description The need to measure, monitor, and understand our living planet is greater than ever. Yet, while many technologies are applied to tackle this need, one developed in the 19th century is transforming tropical ecology. Permanent plots, in which forests are directly sensed tree-by-tree and species-by-species, already provide a global public good. They could make greater contributions still by unlocking our potential to understand future ecological change, as the more that computational and remote technologies are deployed the greater the need to ground them with direct observations and the physical, nature-based skills of those who make them. To achieve this requires building profound connections with forests and disadvantaged communities and sustaining these over time. Many of the greatest needs and opportunities in tropical forest science are therefore not to be found in space or in silico, but in vivo, with the people, places and plots who experience nature directly. These are fundamental to understanding the health, predicting the future, and exploring the potential of Earth’s richest ecosystems. Now is the time to invest in the tropical field research communities who make so much possible.
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spelling pubmed-106481632023-10-28 Sensing Forests Directly: The Power of Permanent Plots Phillips, Oliver L. Plants (Basel) Opinion The need to measure, monitor, and understand our living planet is greater than ever. Yet, while many technologies are applied to tackle this need, one developed in the 19th century is transforming tropical ecology. Permanent plots, in which forests are directly sensed tree-by-tree and species-by-species, already provide a global public good. They could make greater contributions still by unlocking our potential to understand future ecological change, as the more that computational and remote technologies are deployed the greater the need to ground them with direct observations and the physical, nature-based skills of those who make them. To achieve this requires building profound connections with forests and disadvantaged communities and sustaining these over time. Many of the greatest needs and opportunities in tropical forest science are therefore not to be found in space or in silico, but in vivo, with the people, places and plots who experience nature directly. These are fundamental to understanding the health, predicting the future, and exploring the potential of Earth’s richest ecosystems. Now is the time to invest in the tropical field research communities who make so much possible. MDPI 2023-10-28 /pmc/articles/PMC10648163/ /pubmed/37960066 http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/plants12213710 Text en © 2023 by the author. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
spellingShingle Opinion
Phillips, Oliver L.
Sensing Forests Directly: The Power of Permanent Plots
title Sensing Forests Directly: The Power of Permanent Plots
title_full Sensing Forests Directly: The Power of Permanent Plots
title_fullStr Sensing Forests Directly: The Power of Permanent Plots
title_full_unstemmed Sensing Forests Directly: The Power of Permanent Plots
title_short Sensing Forests Directly: The Power of Permanent Plots
title_sort sensing forests directly: the power of permanent plots
topic Opinion
url https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10648163/
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/37960066
http://dx.doi.org/10.3390/plants12213710
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