First-Ever Survey Of Biological Field Stations Complete

Global map of contemporary biological field stations located in 120 countries. (Credit: Laura Tydecks)

Biological field stations have been central to achieving a number of scientific finds. A lot of the acid rain data that informed the 1990 Clean Air Act, for example, came from a long-term data set gathered at the Hubbard Brook Experimental Forest in New Hampshire.

But despite the important data that they provide, few counts of field stations around the world exist. The first one ever, in fact, was only recently completed with help from scientists at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies.

The survey identified 1,268 biological field stations operating in 120 countries around the world, in ecosystems ranging from the tropics to tundra. These were then segmented into those stations monitoring in terrestrial, freshwater or marine areas.

Full results of the survey appear in the journal BioScience. Researchers at the Leibniz-Institute of Freshwater Ecology and Inland Fisheries also contributed to the work.

Top image: Global map of contemporary biological field stations located in 120 countries. (Credit: Laura Tydecks)