2020 Accomplishment Highlights

Mapping crops in near real time across the United States

Forests to faucets: Visualizing forests’ role in supplying drinking water across the U.S.

Hurricane preparedness and recovery guides for southeastern forests, farms, and ranch producers 

Mapping rivercane in the Southeast through community science partnership with the United Keetoowah Band of Cherokee Indians 

Monitoring forest health during a pandemic: satellite-based remote sensing fills a crucial gap

Urbanization and its impacts on water, energy, and carbon

Using forest phenology to understand landscape change

Worldwide effects of non-native species on species-area relationships

Cooperating Experimental Forest added to the SRS Experimental Forest Network

• Research Ecologist Qinfeng Guo served as advisory committee member for the Sino-Eco Association. 
• Research Scientist Michelle Baumfleck served as Associate Editor of the international Journal of Ethnobotany.
• Research Ecologist Qinfeng Guo and NC State collaborating scientist Kevin Potter organized Taking the Macroscale View to Understand Invasion Dynamics across North America, a symposium at the International Association for Landscape Ecology (IALE)-North America meeting, Toronto. May 2020, Virtual.
• Research Ecologist Kurt Riitters contributed to the international report Contributions to the State of the World’s Forests (Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations). FAO and UNEP. 2020. The State of the World’s Forests 2020. Forests, biodiversity and people. Rome. https://doi.org/10.4060/ca8642en. 
• Riitters also co-authored two international reports: Vogt, P., Riitters, K.H., Caudullo, G., Eckhardt, B., FAO – State of the World’s Forests: Forest Fragmentation, EUR 29972 EN, Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg, 2019, ISBN 978-92-76-13036-9, doi:10.2760/145325, JRC118594. And: Vogt, P., Riitters, K.H., Caudullo, G., Eckhardt, B. and Raši, R., An approach for pan-European monitoring of forest fragmentation, EUR 29944 EN, Publications Office of the European Union, Luxembourg, 2019, ISBN 978-92-76-10374-5, doi:10.2760/991401, JRC118541.
• NC State collaborating scientist Dennis Hallema published a translation for international publication: Robinne, F.-N., Hallema, D. W. & Bladon, K. D. (2020). Après les incendies, le casse-tête de la pollution des eaux (Original title: Buried in mud: Wildfires threaten North American water supplies). The Conversation France, Paris, France, 2/23/2020. https://theconversation.com/apres-les-incendies-le-casse-tete-de-la-pollution-des-eaux-132046.

• NC State collaborating scientist Dennis Hallema and Research Scientists Steve McNulty and Ge Sun published a translation for international publication: Hallema, D. W., Kinoshita, A. M., Martin, D. A., Robinne, F.-N., Galleguillos, M., McNulty, S. G., Sun, G., Singh, K. K., Mordecai, R. S. & Moore, P. F. (2019). Incendios, bosques y suministro de agua en ciudades (Original title: Fire, forests and city water supply). Unasylva 251(70): 63-73. Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO). January 2020.  http://www.fao.org/publications/card/en/c/CA6842ES.

• Ge Sun accepted an appointment from the Southern Research Station Director to serve as the new EFETAC Director. Sun's appointment follows a one-year interim in which Kurt Riitters served as acting Director, following Danny Lee's departure to become Director of the new Center for Forest Assessment and Synthesis (CFAS). EFETAC is one of the five research units within CFAS. 
• Three new Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education (ORISE) Fellows began postdoctoral research appointments with EFETAC in summer/fall of 2020. Kristen Emmett and Adam Alsamadisi began working with Lars Pomara and Danny Lee at the Center's Asheville location, and Ning Liu began working with Ge Sun at the RTP location.
• Johnny Boggs accepted a detail position as co-lead for the Southern Experimental Forest Network, alongside SRS scientist Stephanie Laseter. Boggs will continue in his EFETAC position while also serving in this new capacity. In addition to coordinating the activities of the Network to integrate research across the 19 Experimental Forests in the Southern region, Boggs is a member of the Network's governance board. 
• Kevin Potter and Barbara Conkling received two United States Department of Agriculture Certificates of Appreciation presented “in recognition of your outstanding contributions to fulfilling the Forest Service mission of monitoring and reporting on the health of United States forests”, one signed by Rick Cooksey (Acting Director of Forest Health Protection) and one signed by Linda Heath (Director of Inventory, Monitoring, and Assessment Research), October 2020.
• Ge Sun has joined the Board of Directors of the American Water Resources Association (AWRA). Based on Ge’s expertise in hydrology, he was selected by AWRA members to serve in this volunteering leadership position from 2021-2023. The Board helps provide guidance to achieve AWRA’s central mission to advance multidisciplinary water resources education, management, and research. AWRA is recognized as the pre-eminent multidisciplinary grass-roots association for information exchange, professional development and education about water resources and related issues in the United States.