LTER Site Byte

LTER Site: Harvard Forest

Contributor: Emery Boose and Julie Pallant (Sep 15, 2005)

Site Byte:

The functionality of our web page was greatly increased this year through incorporation of online databases in MySQL. This addition has streamlined our application process for on-site research, fellowship positions, and undergraduate (REU) students. In addition, we are posting more dynamic web pages with information submitted to our databases. The 16th annual Harvard Forest LTER Symposium abstracts were submitted and posted entirely on-line.

There is growing interest at our site in extending wireless networking to our main research area (Prospect Hill Tract, 1000 acres). Some interesting technical challenges are presented by the local topography and dense forest (not to mention hurricanes, ice storms, etc). We are also designing and installing a series of long-term hydrological stations across Prospect Hill. One of the goals of the wireless network would be to permit near-real time collection, processing, and display of hydrological data, as we currently do for meteorological data (http://harvardforest.fas.harvard.edu/hfmet/).

Miscellaneous items - Major renovations to our main building (Shaler Hall) involved installation of new network and telephone wiring as well as a new audio-visual system. Great strides were made in the reorganization and classification of the Harvard Forest Library and inclusion of our holdings in the University’s on-line catalog, with generous help from professional librarians at Harvard. A major lightning storm in July caused extensive damage to our phone system, meteorological station, eddy flux towers, and soil warming experiment (whose instrument shack burned to the ground).

We are currently updating our information management system in preparation for our LTER renewal submission in Feb 06. Updates will include data and metadata from our Schoolyard LTER program last year. Plans for the beginning of LTER IV (assuming we’re funded) include migrating our scientific metadata from EML to MySQL, migrating core datasets from flat files to MySQL, and incorporating more spatial data into our information management system.

Web design by Wade Sheldon, Georgia Coastal Ecosystems LTER