Category: Featured

Dag agrees with Fayaz on the uncritical use of niche modeling:

True! This is an important warning for uncritical use of niche models. The niche model predictions of a species distribution does not intend to imply that the species would necessarily be expected to be found there. The niche model only calculates a signature of the ecological climate for the specific occurrence data used to calibrate and train the model.

There’s a lot more.

Shelagh weighs in on that pink banana:

We found that for the high priority Musa taxa (including itinerans, a primary wild relative) occurrence data were lacking in online databases. Data were so sketchy that we were unable to do any sensible mapping. We highlighted the need for a detailed ecogeographic survey of this group.

Jacob shares indigenous knowledge:

Niet op één paard wedden.

What would you say?

Staffan at Gapminder wants you to play:

Please, when you or your visitors find some interesting combination or revelation from the graphs, please let us know. We are soon going to implement a new function where we hint of some of the interesting facts that can be found in the graphs with the possibility to add some explaining text to each graph. We therefore need good stories to tell from the graphs. Just drop us a line if you have an example you want to share with the world!

As if we needed encouraging.

Pablo reminds us there’s a lot already going on on “hidden hunger,” but much still remains to be done:

Much work has been done using a range of approaches to increase the micro-nutrient content of foods and diets. My hope is that the “no brainer” the Economist article refers to is to examine the wide range of approaches to addressing micro-nutrient deficiencies in diets and deliver some added value and fill in current gaps in research.