Scaling ecology across the continent

Abstract

Spatial and Temporal Scaling in Continental‐Scale Ecology Workshop; Boulder, Colorado, 11–12 June 2012 Understanding the functional response of ecosystems across multiple spatial and temporal scales is one of the fundamental challenges in ecology. More than 50 researchers attended a June workshop focused on scaling ecological data from local and regional scales to the continental scale hosted by the National Ecological Observatory Network (NEON). The workshop addressed key issues associated with the influence of scale on the interpretation of ecological variation, particularly in the context of continental‐scale terrestrial ecology. These questions are particularly relevant to NEON, the first ecological observation platform designed to assess the natural and human causes and the biological consequences of environmental change at large scales.