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Aeroecology: Exploring Biodiversity with Radar

Aeroecology: Exploring Biodiversity with Radar

Instructor: Christopher Hassall

Included with

Learn more

2 modules

Gain insight into a topic and learn the fundamentals.

Intermediate level

Recommended experience

1 week to complete

at 10 hours a week

Flexible schedule

Learn at your own pace

2 modules

Gain insight into a topic and learn the fundamentals.

Intermediate level

Recommended experience

1 week to complete

at 10 hours a week

Flexible schedule

Learn at your own pace

What you'll learn

Learn the principles of radar and how radar data can tell us about the diversity and abundance of organisms.
Explore how to apply radar to provide novel approaches to the study of complex questions in biodiversity research.

Skills you'll gain

Tools you'll learn

electromagnetics

Details to know

Shareable certificate

Add to your LinkedIn profile

Assessments

6 assignments¹

AI Graded see disclaimer

Taught in English

91%

of learners achieved a positive career outcome

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There are 2 modules in this course

Learn how aeroecology, a discipline that studies airborne life forms, has been revolutionised with the use of radar with this unique course. This course is designed to help scientists, researchers as well as ecology enthusiasts to develop skills in using radar to explore biodiversity.

You will explore the origins and evolution of radar from a military technology to a powerful tool with multiple scientific applications, including aeroecology. You will then be introduced to studying global biodiversity trends and learn how to evaluate traditional methods and emerging technologies used by scientists to monitor the natural world. You will then delve deeper to understand how radar science can be used to measure and monitor biodiversity and evaluate its advantages over existing methods of biodiversity measurement. Through real life case studies, you will learn how to interpret data visualisations and radar data output, how to quantify the biomass of species, and you will discover the taxonomic limits of the technology. By the end of the course, you will have explored how this new field of study can be used to transform biological and agricultural research as well as inform environmental regulation and policy.

Module details

This first week of content will give you a basic understanding of radar science and biodiversity science. At the end of the week, we will bring the two research areas together and consider how they can inform one another. In the second week, we will explore the more technical aspects of radar aeroecology. We will look at the important and neglected questions that radar can address in biodiversity science, and how radar data can complement other sources of information about the natural world. You will end week 2 with an opportunity to generate your own research idea that builds on your new understanding.

What's included

8 videos11 readings3 assignments5 discussion prompts

8 videosTotal 41 minutes

The story of how a military technology produced surprising scientific applications6 minutes
How does radar work?4 minutes
What is the current state of the art in radar science?3 minutes
Investigating biodiversity trends7 minutes
Introduction to biodiversity methods9 minutes
How can radar measure and monitor biodiversity?6 minutes
What biodiversity can the radar visualise?2 minutes
What biodiversity can radar not visualise?3 minutes

11 readingsTotal 95 minutes

Welcome to Aeroecology: Exploring Biodiversity with Radar10 minutes
About your course and tutor5 minutes
What is “aeroecology”?10 minutes
Lesson 1 overview5 minutes
Exploring radar methods10 minutes
Summary 5 minutes
Lesson 2 overview10 minutes
How does an eco-system collapse?10 minutes
Summary10 minutes
Lesson 3 overview10 minutes
Summary10 minutes

3 assignmentsTotal 70 minutes

Check your understanding10 minutes
Check your understanding30 minutes
Check your understanding30 minutes

5 discussion promptsTotal 50 minutes

Icebreaker10 minutes
Video discussion10 minutes
Exploring radar methods discussion10 minutes
Find and follow a species10 minutes
Limits of existing biodiversity methods10 minutes

Welcome to week two of this course on Aeroecology: exploring biodiversity with radar. In week one of the course, you were introduced to the fundamentals of radar science and biodiversity research, then we brought the two together to explore how the two disciplines can work together to generate biological information from radar data. Week two will develop that initial overview to examine some of the key gaps in our understanding of ecosystems. We will start by looking at how we measure abundance in biodiversity research, and why this is important in an ecological context. We will then move on to look at the importance of measuring diversity, and the extent to which radar is able to do so. I will illustrate these abundance and diversity topics with a range of case studies to show you how radar is currently being applied in some areas. In the final part of the course, we will take a step back and survey the field for future opportunities. The optional assessment involves you as learners becoming practitioners yourselves and exploring these opportunities to find a research area that might be of interest to you.