Crowther Lab

The Crowther Lab is an ecological research group established in 2017 at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich (ETHZ).^[1][2]  Founded by Thomas Crowther through a funding partnership with DOB Ecology, the Lab's mission is to generate globally-relevant ecosystem information that is needed by land managers around the world to improve the success of ecological restoration. Their research aims to form the bridge between theoretical ecology and direct practical action, ultimately providing on-the-ground tools to combat biodiversity loss and climate change.^[3]

In 2020, through a collaboration with Google, the Crowther Lab founded Restor - an open data platform, rooted in science, that enables the public to get involved with ecosystem restoration.^[4]

A part of ETH, Crowther Lab sits within the Department of Environmental Systems Science, ranked number 5 in the world for environmental science research impact.

The Lab brings together ecologists, restoration experts and data scientists.

Research

Major Publications

Crowther Lab scientists have led or co-authored research in a number of academic journals, like Nature, PNAS, Science and Ecology Letters. These publications include:

Soil animal abundance (nematodes)

For every human on earth there are 60 billion nematodes. Understanding their distribution is critical for modelling changes in future climate. At present nematodes are responsible for monthly turnover of 0.14 GT carbon, equal to 10% of human monthly emissions.^[5][6]

Mycorrhizal Status of Global Forests

60% of the world's forests are connected by ectomycorrhizal (EM) fungi, storing huge amounts of carbon. If carbon emissions continue unabated this could result in a loss of 10% of the world's critical EM fungi.^[7][8]

Global Tree Restoration Potential

There is an area of 0.9 billion hectares available for tree restoration. This could store an additional 205 billion tonnes of carbon.^[9][10][9]

Fungal trait expressions

Microbes play a key role in the carbon cycle, governing the exchange of carbon between the earth and atmosphere. This work showed that microbes cultured from warm, moist tropical regions grow faster and are more metabolically active than those from cold, dry boreal areas, which are better able to withstand harsh conditions..^[11]

Carbon stock response to nutrient enrichment

Soil stores approximately twice as much carbon as the atmosphere and fluctuations in the size of the soil carbon pool directly influence climate conditions. When nutrients are added to soil in combination with potassium and micronutrients (e.g. from air pollution), soil carbon stocks changed considerably. Although nutrient enrichment will cause soil carbon gains in most dry, sandy regions, considerable absolute losses of soil carbon may occur in high-latitude regions that store the majority of the world's soil carbon.^[12]

Visualizing Cities by 2050

After modelling the climate of 520 major cities to 2050, they were compared to their most similar city climate that exists today. This research showed that 77% of cities around the world will experience a significant change in climate, with 22% experiencing climate conditions that don't currently exist among major cities today. London in 2050 will be more like Barcelona's climate today. Moscow will resemble Sofia and Stockholm will resemble Vienna.^{[13][14][15][16]}

The global soil community and its impact of biogeochemistry

Soil is the largest carbon store on land, storing as much carbon as vegetation and the atmosphere combined. Soil carbon storage is highest in cold regions like Siberia, with very low metabolic activity. In contrast there is a much greater diversity of soil organisms in tropical regions, but this leads to much higher carbon cycling. It is anticipated that positive feedbacks from warming soils will accelerate climate change by up to 17%.^[16]

Quantifying global soil carbon losses in response to warming

Most terrestrial carbon is stored in the soil. If global warming causes the loss of this carbon to the atmosphere, it could cause further warming; this research supports the idea that temperature rise will stimulate net loss of soil carbon to the air. This positive land carbon–climate feedback could speed up climate change.^[17]

Initiatives

In 2015 Thomas Crowther was recognized for mapping the distribution and diversity of trees across the world for the first time. This research estimated that there are approximately 3 trillion trees on Earth, 46% fewer than at the onset of agriculture about 12,000 years ago. This new knowledge played a key role in establishing the Trillion Trees initiative and transforming the UN's Billion Tree Campaign into the Trillion Tree Campaign.

Scientific initiatives

Global Forest Biodiversity Initiative

Thomas Crowther and other scientists came together to compile the Global Forest Biodiversity Initiative (GFBI) made of forester and forest scientists studies and manages the world's largest tree-level forest inventory database. This network has gathered more than 1.2 million tree-level plots, from over 70 countries. The GFBI is also a platform aiming at disseminating research and forest education internationally as well as giving access to global forest inventory data and services.^[18]

Global Soil Biodiversity Initiative

The Global Soil Biodiversity Initiative (GSBI) is designed to create a global collaboration of scientists, all with the goals of informing the public, promoting this information into environmental policy, and overall creating a platform for the current and future sustainability of soils. The network made of more than a hundred scientists, all over the world, have built up a dataset containing over 11,000 soil samples, from over 50 countries, allowing ecosystem services to incorporate scientific knowledge in their projects.

Public partnerships and initiatives

In January 2020 the Crowther Lab was appointed as supporting partner and scientific advisor to the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration, a global initiative highlighting the need for greatly increased global cooperation to restore degraded and destroyed ecosystems, contributing to efforts to combat climate change and safeguard biodiversity, food security, and water supply.

At the 2020 World Economic Forum, in partnership with Marc and Lynne Benioff, announced the launch of 1T.org. With the support of Jane Goodall, Inger Andersen, Thomas Crowther and others, it was announced that the platform aimed to facilitate the conservation and restoration of one trillion trees within the decade.^[19]

Together with Nature

Following criticisms of the communication of nature based solutions as a “silver-bullet” solution, the Crowther Lab collaborated with more than 92 civil society experts and 52 businesses to raise awareness around the inherent risks to consider in order to realize a positive impact for biodiversity, human well-being, and climate change. This followed a letter Prof. Crowther wrote to The Guardian on 21 February 2020 ‘Backing the trillion tree campaign to combat climate crisis”.^[20][21]

Restor

In 2020, Thomas Crowther founded Restor, an open data platform of ecological insights for the global restoration community. Ecologists at the Crowther Lab at ETH Zurich use machine learning models, field data, satellite imagery and environmental information to generate new maps that describe global ecosystems. The concept for Restor was to apply this process to benefit the global restoration movement and to provide restoration practitioners with ecological data about their locations.

In 2020, the Crowther Lab at ETH Zurich began working with Google Earth Engine to build and scale this idea into Restor in collaboration with a wide network of restoration projects, communities, scientists, and environmental organizations around the world. Organizations such as Restor is built for and with organizations of all sizes that work in the restoration space who are planning, managing and monitoring restoration projects.

This idea is centred on responsible ecosystem restoration, as system dynamics are varied and nuanced on local levels. Restor aims to enable everyone, everywhere to get involved with ecosystem restoration.^{[22] [23][24]}

References

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