Following rigorous review, the Smithsonian National Zoological Park’s 3,200-acre Conservation and Research Center in Front Royal, Va., was recently selected as a candidate core site for the National Ecological Observatory Network, a planned continental-scale ecological observatory. This national observatory will consist of fixed and mobile sensors located in 20 wild areas across the continental United States, as well as in Alaska, Hawaii and Puerto Rico. NEON is a project of the National Science Foundation.

The Conservation and Research Center is NEON’s candidate core site for the mid-Atlantic region. Candidate core sites were selected through analysis of more than 90 proposed locations in 20 ecoclimatic regions in the United States. Sites were chosen that best represent the ecological and climatic characteristics of their specific region.

Instruments on towers erected at the core sites will take continuous readings of a variety of climate and ecological data, such as atmospheric chemistry, soil moisture and biogeochemistry, solar radiation, forest canopy microclimates, precipitation and temperature. The NEON design also includes instruments that will track patterns and changes in small streams. Staff scientsits will collect samples of a variety of organisms at each site, such as birds, fish, plants, small mammals and microbes. NEON will collect data for at least 30 years, a period considered adequate by scientists to observe most ecological trends at the continental scale.
The NEON project is on schedule for a final design review with the National Science Foundation in 2009. If an award is made for construction, the plan is to build NEON over approximately five to seven years in order to spread out costs and reduce risk.

“For the Smithsonian, NEON represents a renaissance in ecological research as we create new scientific and education synergies that will allow ecological forecasting,” said Francisco Dallmeier, head of the National Zoo’s Center for Conservation Education and Sustainability. “It is a dream come true to be able to integrate the ecological research and monitoring we do at the Smithsonian with a national network of top scientists backed by state-of-the-art instrumentation and infrastructure.