Ecology
Our understanding of the living world remains incomplete—from mapping unexplored biodiversity to engineering closed ecosystems. By building and deploying novel monitoring technologies, creating comprehensive datasets and machine learning models, we can unlock new insights into animal behavior, ecosystem dynamics and tipping points, and the potential for ecosystem restoration.
R&D Gaps (4)
We lack the models and infrastructure to monitor and predict how ecosystems behave under stress or when they might collapse, as well as what metrics to use to determine that restoration is effective. We need to understand the underlying dynamics, feedback loops, and thresholds that lead to ecosystem...
Regenerating degraded environments and designing self-sustaining systems require a unified understanding of ecological dynamics. Our current models fall short in predicting complex interactions—such as feedback loops and stability thresholds—that determine ecosystem behavior.
To close this gap, we...
Much of Earth's biosphere—from the deep ocean to atmospheric bioaerosols—remains unexplored, with the microbial majority largely uncharted. Advancing new exploration technologies and systematically cataloging the Earth's microbiome could unlock discoveries of new life forms and biological insights t...
Nature’s blueprints span from the unseen nanoworld to the enigmatic origins of life. Despite the incredible diversity of nanostructures, many remain hidden due to current imaging limitations. Likewise, the mysteries of animal communication—crucial for decoding behavioral cues and social structures—a...