CAREER: Understanding the conservation and restoration potential of retired agricultural land: An ecoinformatics approach

将土地转为农业或不再用于农业是全球环境变化的一个核心组成部分，对全世界的人和自然系统都有影响。在包括美国在内的发达国家，用于农业生产的土地面积正在缩小，留下了数百万公顷的以前或“退休”的农业用地，这些土地往往嵌在生产性和半自然土地的马赛克中。目前尚不清楚是否、在何处以及何时退役的农业用地有利于这些景观中的生物多样性和生态系统服务。鉴于农业景观无处不在，生物多样性急剧下降，填补这一空白至关重要。利用数据驱动的方法，本研究将促进对植被恢复的驱动因素和退役农业用地潜在保护价值的理解，这可以帮助决策者和科学家管理这些土地，为人类和自然社区的福祉服务。该职业奖的培训部分将包括课程开发和讲习班，以数据驱动技术应用于高中至博士生的生态和环境问题。本研究将利用遥感、因果推理和连通性建模方法，应用于集约管理的农业景观，以阐明退耕农用地植被和演替的控制机制，了解退耕农用地的空间分布如何影响景观破碎化和连通性，以及3)检验退耕农用地是作物害虫的净源还是净汇。教育部分将让当地高中和一年级本科生参与空间生态学和数据驱动环境科学的实践研究和培训，并培养管理、处理和分析大型空间数据集和数据产品的专业硕士和博士研究生，以解决可处理但复杂的农业生态问题。该奖项反映了美国国家科学基金会的法定使命，并通过使用基金会的知识价值和更广泛的影响审查标准进行评估，被认为值得支持。

The conversion of land both to and away from agriculture is a central component of global environmental change, with implications for both people and natural systems worldwide. In developed countries including the US, land area in agricultural production is contracting leaving millions of hectares of former or “retired” agricultural land often nested in a mosaic of productive and semi-natural lands. It remains unclear whether, where, and when retired agricultural lands are beneficial to biodiversity and ecosystem services in these landscapes. Given the ubiquity of agricultural landscapes and the dramatic biodiversity declines therein, such a gap is crucial to fill. Using a combination of data-driven methods, this research will advance understanding of the drivers of revegetation and the potential conservation value of retired agricultural lands, which can help policy-makers and scientists manage these lands for the well-being of human and natural communities. The training component of this CAREER award will include curriculum development and workshops on the application of data-driven techniques to ecological and environmental problems targeted at high school through PhD students. This research will leverage remote sensing, causal inference, and connectivity modeling methods applied to intensively managed agricultural landscapes to 1) elucidate the mechanisms governing revegetation and succession on retired agricultural lands, 2) understand how the spatial distribution of retired lands influences landscape fragmentation and connectivity, and 3) test whether retired land functions as a net source or sink of crop pests. The education component will engage local high school and first year undergraduates in hands-on research and training in spatial ecology and data-driven environmental science, and train professional master’s and PhD students in managing, processing and analyzing large spatial datasets and data products to address tractable but complex agricultural ecology questions.This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.