The opening of the American Museum of Natural History's new exhibition, Our Global Kitchen: Food, Nature, Culture, this Saturday (Nov. 17) comes at an interesting time. 

The exhibit, which will look at food production throughout history and address the challenge we currently face of feeding an ever-growing population without destroying the planet as we do so, comes just days before Thanksgiving, the nation's holiday most focused on food as celebratory act. Obviously, as this is an annual holiday, the exhibition planners no doubt planned the opening with Thanksgiving in mind. The second reason the timing is interesting, though, is due to an event that no one could have anticipated well in advance. The AMNH is located in New York City, which, along with other areas of the East Coast, is still recovering from Hurricane Sandy. In recognition of these dichotomous events, Ellen V. Futter, president of the AMNH, said in a press release, "As the Museum prepares to open this comprehensive exhibition on the subject of food, we find ourselves disquietingly poised between the extremes of Hurricane Sandy--with its extensive devastation, including disruption to the food supply--and...Thanksgiving. In such a timely and vivid context, the Museum presents Our Global Kitchen, which addresses the vital and complex topic of food from the perspectives of the environment, food supply, and human culture."

The irony was not lost on the 300 or so environmental scientists, policy makers, activists and citizens who gathered earlier this week at the Aspen Institute for three days of solution-seeking around the theme, "Living in the New Normal." Even as participants in Aspen Environment Forum 2012 shared information, ideas and opinions, haze from the forest fires currently ravaging Colorado hung over the nearby mountains. This, more than one participant commented, is the new normal: uncertainty, extremes, unpredictability, unexpected turns of events - all brought on by humans' fiddling with the dials of nature on a grandiose scale.

Of course it's relatively easy to talk about troubles. But that's not what AEF2012 was about. The forum focused not only on defining the new normal, but also on exploring what we ought to do about it. Should we let us take it where it will? Or should we engage? Will we be tossed about like ships at sea? Or will we work to understand the changes taking shape, and shape our own activities to make both most compatible with the preservation of life on Earth?

Perhaps the best way to get a sampling of the conversations is to pull some participant quotes and paraphrases from the Twitter stream (#AEF2012):

If we continue at the present rate of eliminating species, half of them will be gone by the end of the century. - E.O. Wilson

The bulk of the credit for maintaining a planet that works goes to a living ocean. - Sylvia Earle

60,000-90,000 years ago, there may have only been 600-2,000 human beings. We were an endangered species at one time. - Richard Potts

‎‏ We *have* to figure out how to close the gap - to bring environmental externalities into pricing. - Jason Clay

The past is no longer any guide for the future. This planet (w/new climate, biosphere, land use, ocean acidification) is new. - Jon Foley

Abruptness in climate change creates largely unpredictable side-effects. - William Calvin

Eating tuna is like eating something that feeds on dragons. Very high on the food chain. - Daniel Pauly

What happens in the Arctic doesn't stay in the Arctic. - Neal Conan

If you're pro-free market and ignore biggest market failure on planet (CO2), you have a problem. - Gernot Wagner

We have the tools at our disposal to end overfishing. We should start tackling the problem now. - Miguel Jorge

Comparing block to block, house to house, there is 7% greater property value to tree lined streets. - Rohit Aggarwala

In public's eye, pollution is top ocean problem. In reality, it's #3, behind overfishing & climate change. - Ayana Johnson

When you say "climate" it turns people off because they fear they'll have to reduce their quality of life. - Heidi Cullen

Not climate change or global warming, but planetary destabilization. - David Orr

‎‏The future of America is networked resilient communities. - John Robb

Never eat shrimp: either caught with 90% bycatch net, or in mangrove-destroying aquaculture. - Ayana Johnson

We have to be careful about what we can measure and what matters - Daniel Pauly

We need to make climate an economic issue, because it is. - Mindy Lubber

The notion that our emergence occurred during the most violent period of climate fluctuation means that we're able to adapt. - Richard Potts

We need to preserve ecosystems as working systems, for us to learn from and emulate in the Anthropocene. Not keep as museum pieces. - Jon Foley

Don't fish, you have zero fish. Fish too much, you have zero fish. Sustainable fishing is in between. - Daniel Pauly

Smart growth is the greatest technology we have to fight climate change, and its not in any of the books. - Peter Calthorpe

Trawling is like using a bulldozer to catch songbirds. - Sylvia Earle

The past can no longer be a guide to the future.- Dennis Dimick

No farmer is going to invest in sustainability if they don't have land rights. - Jason Clay

Let's celebrate successes in sustainable agriculture - and scale them up. - Chris Reij

U.S. agricultural research budget has gone to hell in a handbasket. - Dan Glickman

‎‏Something that people often miss: resilience doesn't just mean strengthened rule of law, it also means stronger civil society. - Jamais Cascio

We thought the ocean was too big to fail. Now we know otherwise. - Sylvia Earle

Why should unsustainable products cost less? They should cost more because they are subsidized by nature. - Jason Clay

If there's an elephant in the room with the global food system, it's a cow. - Jon Foley

Like to learn more? Check out video of select AEF2012 panel presentations here.

For a health project she was working on, University of Minnesota sociologist Anne Meier needed to know the average elevation, temperature and rainfall by district in Ghana, Tanzania and Malawi. Tracy Kugler, a research associate at the Minnesota Population Center, was happy to oblige. After about 20 hours of gathering, organizing, integrating, and processing data from a half-dozen separate databases, she was able to hand over Meier the information she needed.

And that, Kugler says, is why she's spending much of the rest of her time helping to get a massive new population and environment database known as Terra Populus - TerraPop for short - up and running. If TerraPop had been in place, Meier not only could have gathered her own data, she could have done it in well under an hour.

TerraPop is a massive initiative of the Minnesota Population Center, the Institute on the Environment, University of Minnesota Libraries, and faculty from the College of Liberal Arts and College of Science and Engineering at the University of Minnesota, along with collaborators from Columbia University and the University of Michigan. Funded by an $8 million grant from the National Science Foundation, the project is gathering land cover, land use, climate and census data from around the world and across two centuries into a common database that researchers anywhere can use to answer questions about complex relationships between people and their environment. 

Perhaps the biggest challenge TerraPop faces is figuring out how to get data from many different places, gathered at many different scales, at many different times, for many different parameters, and in many different formats, together in a way that provides meaningful information.

Initially, the database will bring together individual- and household-level from selected countries, aggregated population data, and climate, and land use and land cover data. At later stages, the TerraPop team plans to expand the database to include census data from additional countries, additional environmental data, and additional dimensions of human data, such as economic and health data. A prototype system is scheduled to be available for beta-testing in spring 2013, and should be available to the public around the end of 2013.

"We expect that the system will be valuable to researchers in multiple disciplines, including sociology, demography, climatology, geography, environmental sciences, epidemiology, as well as cross-disciplinary research communities concerned with human-environment interactions, such as environmental justice, landscape ecology, hazards, sustainability, and health, and natural resources management," Kugler says. "Our overall goal is to lower the data acquisition and processing barriers involved in studying questions of how people interact with the environment."

Like to learn more about TerraPop, join the development community or be part of the beta test group? Check out TerraPop's website at www.terrapop.org.

BY JOHN GORDON


Whether the planet is ready for it or not, by 2050 approximately 9 billion people will be living on Earth.

How can we expect to support 9 billion, when today we struggle to feed 7 billion?

There's not an easy answer to that question. But a Discovery Grant from the Institute on the Environment has made it possible for the Science Museum of Minnesota to at least break it down into an entertaining 9-minute film.



The issue of food production is complicated by the fact that we already use about 40 percent of Earth's land surface for agriculture, and there simply isn't much available arable land left. Increasing global cropland area would require clearing natural ecosystems and destroying the valuable services they provide.



Formatted for spherical displays (such as the Science on a Sphere and Magic Planet systems), the new film, "2 Billion More Coming to Dinner," features data sets developed by IonE's Global Landscapes Initiative, and presents challenges and potential solutions for our hungry planet.

How is global cropland distributed, and exactly how much does each area produce? With ideal fertilization and irrigation, how much could each area produce? Which regions show the greatest gap between current and potential production, and what would it take to close that gap, maximizing food production? Spherical visualizations and a conversational narrative style address each of these questions in the film.


"
2 Billion More Coming to Dinner" also considers what kinds of food we eat. To support the animals that feed us, a significant amount of cropland is devoted to producing animal feed instead of human food. A "food vs. feed" GLI data set is visualized as a global map of who produces crops mostly for direct consumption by people, and whose cropland is largely used for growing animal feed. Without offering a direct course of action, the film allows viewers to consider the data and how it might apply to their behavior.
 


How can you become one of these viewers? You'll soon be able to find "2 Billion More Coming to Dinner" at one of the world's 80 Science on a Sphere installations. Also, the film and its associated data sets will soon be available for free download from the Science Museum of Minnesota at sciencebuzz.org/earth. It's a fun showcase of a small part of IonE and GLI's work, and we hope people enjoy it!
 


Greetings from Canada!

IonE was on the road this past week at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) annual meeting in Vancouver.

Before I get to the actual conference, I just have to say, "Wow, the city was amazing!" Between the views of the ocean, vast forests and snowcapped mountains, the conference location was a smashing success (despite a few raindrops).

Within the rooms of the conference center, IonE researchers were front and center during a number of fascinating sessions.

During two separate symposia, IonE director Jon Foley pitched a plan for increasing food production while decreasing agriculture's environmental impacts. One of his more memorable quotes: "Two billion more people are coming to dinner ¬- but even so, changing diets is, and will be, a bigger driver of food demand globally."

IonE resident fellow and College of Science and Engineering professor Julian Marshall gave a talk titled, "Verifying Health and Emission Improvements from Stove Change-Outs." One of the main takeaways from Julian's presentation was that the team's research is primarily "market-driven" rather than "research-driven" - which means much of the work is being done on the ground in the community of Karnataka, India. Julian also spoke about the success of the Acara program in a separate symposium focused on addressing grand sustainability challenges through global cooperation.

Dominic Travis in the U's College of Veterinary Medicine presented an overview of the One Health Central and East Africa Network (OHCEA). Global Health and the Environment in Africa - part of OHCEA - was one of the earliest Discovery Grants funded by IonE (along with others, including USAID). The project researchers work at the intersections of animal health, human health and environment

One of the greatest things about the AAAS meeting is the diversity of topics on display. It's a science geek-fest in the best possible way! Some of my favorite sessions covered geo-engineering, marine biological diversity, the atlas of Islamic world science, planetary boundaries, indigenous perspectives on climate change and more.

The most fun I had, though, was during a session titled Bad Presenter Bingo: The Science Communication Game You Don't Want to Win. My favorite comment by presenter Monica Metzler: "You're not dumbing down science [by simplifying your slides]. You're making it accessible to your audience." Great advice, indeed.

"Fill your brain for free," the advance publicity said. And that's just what folks did last week as 22 Institute on the Environment resident fellows made lively five-minute "Outburst!" presentations on the Big Question they're addressing, how they're doing it, and what it means for the rest of us.

Watch the archived presentation here - or, for just a taste of the talks and the variety of topics covered, check out this sample of live-tweets from attendees:

Partying with the Institute on the Environment #Outburst!

Jon Foley introducing Outburst! now. Why are we here at Institute on the Environment? To have an impact in the world.

I love how people in computer science are interested in real problems, and want to study / save the planet!

Okediji: the right regulatory framework allows us to capture the value of climate change technology

Now at Outburst! Volkan Isler on robotic systems for collecting data, starting with carp (yes, fish)

New concept - "Environmental nutrition" or environmental science merged with nutrition and health

"2 Billion More Coming to Dinner" film coming soon out of Institute on the Environment and Sci Museum collaboration

Robotic data mules replace graduate students... at least for tedious tasks

At Outburst! James Forester on how movement ecology interacts w/ disease

Costs and time for patenting green technology create imperative for a fast-track system

How can our developing world technology be made available for the "bottom billion" to survive, thrive?

In response to climate change, can we create fast track licensing mechanism for green technology for global south?

Klass: federal laws and state laws need to be harmonized to get our national energy infrastructure in shape.

Banerjee says twitter helps researchers understand public sentiment, find new stories... so I will tweet EVEN MORE

Geoengineering governance? We HAVE NOT thought through the law. At all.

Make law work better for environment and justice? Crazy!

Computer science can help us understand abrupt changes in climate, can help complete large forest ecology database

Household flux calculator - measure your impact on the flux of nutrients in the environment!

Outburst! Is perfect for those of us who are ADD and love learning about everything. AKA most environmental people I know.

We lack mechanisms for cost sharing for smart grid transmission - resulting in our current clunky system

An application of Shekhar's research? Evacuation route planning so transportation plans are sustainable

In Haiti, neighborhoods must be self sufficient, of necessity, and community approach fits culture

How can Midwestern agriculture create new prosperity and public goods by producing more from the same land base?

Spatial Data Mining - great potential for advancing climate science

Membrane filtration or reverse osmosis, important mechanism to get clean water

Neighborhood scale district energy systems part of the sustainability plans at UMore Park

In India, hydrological change, agriculture and the economy are linked, and dramatically impact food security

All water on northern plains (Canada) goes through Lake Winnipeg, a resource shared by 4 provinces, 2 states

Osofsky tells how multidimensional environment and energy governance and justice could be our path for better future

More from Osofsky - environmental justice and the BP oil spill shows we need better legal/ governance structures

Household flux calculator - measure your own flux!

In an area of heavy commercial forest harvesting sits the Wanang Research Area in Papua New Guinea

Air pollution among top 15 global cuause of mortality, estimated to cause 1M premature deaths annually

At Outburst! Jonathan Schilling asks "How do fungi eat and WHO CARES?" Hmmm.

Schilling: Fungi are gutless, toothless and heartless wonders.

Wood-degrading fungi provide lessons for bioconversion, may capture VOCs, methane

Now at Outburst! Alex Klass from law school on how to build out nation-wide grid for transmission of electricity

Nanotechnology widely used now, in 1000s of products. What is it? Engineered and very small

A Minnesota design team works hand in hand with Guanacaste national park staff in Costa Rica - on a coloring book

Why care about transmission? Current system weighed down by waste and makes incorporating renewables difficult.

Threshold: things flip over into a new state. A key element of human-environment systems.

Manson says if "complex" is too complicated for you - think "black swan" instead

Occupational disease risk high in India due to scarcity of infrastructure for enforcement, weak power of labor

Comparing India and China, lessons for rapid industrial growth and occupational health

Now at Outburst! Gurumurthy Ramachandran says "I win the award for longest name" Guess so.