Is my city's ecosystem healthy?

[Ariel Levi Simons]

Ever wonder how nature is doing out your back window?  I know I have, especially as an ecologist working from home during COVID.  Luckily I had a team of UCLA undergrads, time, and a bunch of computing resources to map out biodiversity patterns in Los Angeles.

Here it is, Constructing ecological indices for urban environments using species distribution models.  Published in Urban Ecosystems, the tldr is: Using community science data on when and where species were photographed, maps of different environmental values (such as elevation and light pollution), and some machine learning, we were able to predict the diversity of both birds and flowering plants across the Los Angeles area.  The results are pretty unsurprising, but the next step is to start adding in species detected using DNA extracted from the environment as input.

Got questions?  Just ask!

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Ariel Levi Simons