Biodiversity Dashboard
It seems more frequently that intensive research and efforts to raise awareness about biodiversity are focused on the Global Noth, particularly in North America and Europe. Researchers at Yale University and the Field Museum of Chicago partnered together to create the Biodiversity Dashboard, where people can search for species and see their distribution ranges, working with the creators of the popular Map of Life to launch their dashboard. The Biodiversity Dashboard lists nearly 5,500 species in and around National Parks in Columbia, Ecuador, and Peru, three of the world’s most biodiverse nations. Users can simply browse the different species that are on the Biodiversity Dashboard, or the site can be used by land managers and conservationists in those countries to better plan protected areas, coordinate research, or do other work where species distribution information is pertinent. South America hosts incredibly rich biodiversity throughout the continent, and 5,500 is by no means the full encapsulation of the richness that it contains. However, there is the issue of research, which is often done in protected areas like those samples by the Biodiversity Dashboard, and available resources, so the number of species and the focus areas could very well grow with time. Like other technologies, providing more information is a double-edged sword; information can be used with the goal of protection and furthering research, or it can be used for targeted exploitation and exposure of already vulnerable species, and perhaps should be a consideration in the availability of sensitive information. The website is scheduled to be launched later in 2020, so the initiative will no doubt be refined over time.
Hathaway, Bill. “Yale, Field Museum map species diversity in South American national parks.” Yale News, April 30, 2020. https://news.yale.edu/2020/04/30/yale-field-museum-map-species-diversity-south-american-national-parks
Categories
Aesthetic/Leisure, Biodiversity, Climate Change, Data, Ecological Modelling
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