Constructing a Long-Term Ecological Research Program at the NTS: Building on Past EPSCoR Success to Create a Scientific Center of Excellence in Nevada

9871942科尔曼在北卡罗来纳州建立长期生态研究计划为了将内华达州S大学系统提升到世界级的竞争力水平，一个由全国公认的专家组成的小组建议内华达州：(1)基于科学实力、独特性、可资助性和与S州长期科学计划的一致性，发展州级卓越中心；(2)利用内华达州试验场的独特机会。专家们还明确将内华达州S全球环境变化计划确定为潜在目标区域。目前的项目符合这些建议，并将增加必要的实验基础设施和遥感技术，以将对沙漠生态系统潜在长期变化的调查与降雨量增加、氮沉积增加和生活在沙漠土壤表面的微生物结皮的退化结合在一起，以便在NTS的内华达沙漠面貌设施(NDFF)进行关于二氧化碳升高对完整沙漠生态系统的影响的正在进行的工作。该项目将：(1)帮助巩固内华达州的卓越科学中心，从而潜在地对内华达州S的研究竞争力产生非常积极的短期影响；(2)使整个州受益，因为内华达州的三个主要研究机构之间开展了独特的合作；(3)解决了对内华达州乃至世界都具有重要生态意义的问题，以及(4)在对内华达州S长期经济发展至关重要的地点新南威尔士州创建一个世界级的研究设施。

9871942 Coleman Constructing a Long-Term Ecological Research Program at the NTS In order to move Nevada s university system to a world-class level of competitiveness, a panel of nationally recognized experts has recommended that the State of Nevada: (1) develop state centers of excellence, based on scientific strength, uniqueness, fundability, and consistency with the state s long-range science plan and (2) exploit the unique opportunities of the Nevada Test Site (NTS). The experts also explicitly identified Nevada s Global Environmental Change Program (NevGEC) as a potential target area. The current project is consistent with these recommendations and will add the experimental infrastructure and remote sensing technology necessary to integrate investigations of potential long-term changes of a desert ecosystem to increased precipitation, increased nitrogen deposition, and degradation of a microbiotic crust that lives on the surface of desert soil to ongoing work on the effects of elevated CO2 on an intact desert ecosystem at the Nevada Desert Face Facility (NDFF) on the NTS. This project will: (1) help solidify a scientific center of excellence in Nevada and thus potentially have a very positive short-term impact on Nevada s research competitiveness; (2) benefit the entire state as the NevGEC Program is a unique collaboration between the three main research institutions in Nevada; (3) address an issue of ecological importance to Nevada and to the world, and (4) create a world-class research facility on the NTS, a site that is critical to Nevada s long-term economic development.