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Monitoring plant functional diversity from space

Nature Plants volume 2, Article number: 16024 (2016) Cite this article

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An Erratum to this article was published on 14 March 2016

The world's ecosystems are losing biodiversity fast. A satellite mission designed to track changes in plant functional diversity around the globe could deepen our understanding of the pace and consequences of this change, and how to manage it.

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Figure 1: The data gap in regional species trait measurements.
Figure 2: The envisioned global biodiversity observatory.

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Acknowledgements

This study is an output of the ‘Biodiversity from Space’ Working Group of the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS) and was produced with support from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) grant no. NNX14AN31G to NCEAS, University of California, Santa Barbara. Part of this research was carried out at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, under a contract with NASA. The work also benefited from National Science Foundation (NSF) grant nos GEO-1408965 (or “Support for the Future Earth Interim Director and Implementation”) and DBI-1262600; NASA grant no. NNX11AP72G to W.J. and R.G.; NSF–NASA Dimensions of Biodiversity grant no. DEB-1342872 to J.C.B.; and the University of Zurich Research Priority Program on ‘Global Change and Biodiversity’ to M.E.S. and F.D.S.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Yale University, 165 Prospect Street, New Haven, 06520, Connecticut, USA

    Walter Jetz

  2. Department of Ecology, Evolution and Behavior, University of Minnesota, 1987 Upper Buford Circle, St Paul, 55108, Minnesota, USA

    Jeannine Cavender-Bares

  3. Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, 4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, 91109, California, USA

    Ryan Pavlick & David Schimel

  4. National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis, University of California, Santa Barbara, 735 State Street, Suite 300, Santa Barbara, 93101, California, USA

    Frank W. Davis & Mark P. Schildhauer

  5. Department of Global Ecology, Carnegie Institution of Washington, 260 Panama Street, Stanford, 94305, California, USA

    Gregory P. Asner

  6. Florida Museum of Natural History, University of Florida, Gainesville, 32611, Florida, USA

    Robert Guralnick

  7. Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, Hans-Knöll-Straße 10, Jena, 07745, Germany

    Jens Kattge & Ulrike Stahl

  8. Department of Plant Sciences, University of California, Davis, 139 Veihmeyer Hall, Davis, 95616, California, USA

    Andrew M. Latimer

  9. Harvard University, 26 Oxford Street, HMNH, Suite 43, Cambridge, 02138, Massachusetts, USA

    Paul Moorcroft

  10. University of Zurich, Winterthurerstrasse 190, Zurich, CH-8057, Switzerland

    Michael E. Schaepman & Fabian D. Schneider

  11. School of Geography, University of Brighton, 9 Old Court Close, Brighton, BN1 8HF, UK

    Franziska Schrodt

  12. Center for Spatial Technologies and Remote Sensing, University of California, Davis, 139 Veihmeyer Hall, Davis, 95616, California, USA

    Susan L. Ustin

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Contributions

W.J. and J.C.-B. contributed equally to this work.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Walter Jetz or Jeannine Cavender-Bares.

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Jetz, W., Cavender-Bares, J., Pavlick, R. et al. Monitoring plant functional diversity from space. Nature Plants 2, 16024 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nplants.2016.24

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