We are organizing a ‘High Latitude Drone Ecology’ workshop during the upcoming AGU meeting in San Francisco.

Time: Weds, 14 Dec 2016, 10:15 am – 12:00pm (apologies for any session conflicts!)

We will discuss the following general topics:

A. Shared methods and protocols across sites
Hardware/software interfaces, sensor choices, and high-latitude-specific challenges can make the barrier to entry for consistent and comparable near-surface remote sensing approaches a challenge.  We will discuss what systems and protocols may work well across sites, and for various levels of UAV operator specialization.  Other subjects can include training opportunities, hardware and software troubleshooting, and ideas about shared data repositories.

B. High latitude UAV synthesis paper
There is an opportunity to guide polar UAV research via a synthesis and perspectives paper that identifies critical research themes and use-cases for UAV work in these rapidly changing (low canopy!) regions.

C. Strategic planning for funding, research, and policy development relevant to high latitude use cases
This working group can be a chance to discuss what research questions a drone network can ask better than a project at a single site, what are the current foci of various research groups, and determine if there are common data that all groups can systematically collect with minimal additional effort.  Regulatory environments are evolving rapidly in this field, and this poses an opportunity to share up to date information on recent changes and/or to guide science-positive policy in this area.

If you would like to participate in the workshop please RSVP to Jeff Kerby.  We will send out a summary of the meeting to interested parties who are not able to attend.

The HLDEN AGU team