About the FEEL Project:
In attemptying to understand ecological phenomena in-depth and over the long-term, many different disciplines of knowledge are called upon. The myriad of processes and functionings within ecosystems as well as their relationships with the biotic and abiotic components of the planet are so complex, intricate, and interrelated, that a truly multi-disciplinary team is needed to engage in meaningful long-term research.
|
(Photo credit: Lina DiGregorio, Design/Artwork: Adam Kennedy and Bill Feeny) |
The FEEL project is composed and supported by a diverse range of dedicated individuals, bringing together resources from the public, private, academic, and governmental sectors. If you are pursuing research activities in the fields of forest ecophysiology or ecohydrology, are interested by the topics, or would like to donate funding or equipment to the FEEL project, we welcome your inquiries. Please contact us if you have any questions or would like to apply for a FEEL research account.
One of the core components of the project is its database-driven, online web application and research platform: FEEL-DB. FEEL-DB is linked via a combination of telemetry and land-lines to an extensive network of environmental sensors located in Watershed 01 of HJ Andrews Experimental Forest. By using web-based technology, the extensive amount of data from the project is centrally accessible to all researchers, with data processing and storage capabilities supported by a robust and extensible computing platform.
Different layers of the application handle the necessary tasks including: storing incoming data as it is transmitted from the sensor network, processing this raw data into the primary layers of the database, handling web user interface requests, as well as advanced post-processing of the raw data. Access to the various layers of the database is authenticated within a tiered hierarchy of user permission levels.
FEEL-DB is hosted on servers maintained by the system administrators at Central Web Services of Oregon State University. We would like to express our gratitude to CWS team for their continuing assistance and support of this project.
