July 2003
ORION to dramatically increase the pace of forestry research
Creating a balanced ecological approach to forestry management requires increasingly sophisticated methods and tools for obtaining and analysing multiple layers of information and in Thunder Bay a new tool is being tested to make it easier to work through these layers.
At Lakehead University and the Legacy Forest Project, the ORION network is expected to dramatically increase the pace of research in this critical field.
The Legacy Forest Project involves 1,000,000 hectares of forest land in Northwestern Ontario that is being put under a microscope to study the long-term impact of commercial forestry and intensive logging activity.
Although a section of the forest is being used for commercial timber management, the land represents the convergence of three major ecosystems, the confluence of three major climate systems, the headwaters of three continental watersheds, and the continental north-south divide.
Geographic Information Systems (GIS) laboratories, such as the one at Lakehead, rely on access to layers of raw data, including LANDSAT (Land Remote-Sensing Satellite) colour-infrared images and high-resolution digital aerial photographs, to monitor and study millions of acres of forest.
Just one of these aerial images represents 350 megabytes of data. Lakehead has compiled over 150 gigabits of images for the Legacy Forest Project intended to provide a “one-stop shopping” data warehouse for researchers and requires maximum bandwidth to be fully functional.
"For researchers in different locations, collaborating on the analysis of images currently means having to burn data onto CDs and courier them to their destination. It can take hours, or even a whole day, to get feedback," says Ulf Runesson, Associate Professor, Lakehead University Faculty of Forestry and the Forest Environment and director of the Legacy Forest Project’s Data Warehouse, Image Archive, Quetico Inventory and Website.
"ORION will make it possible to access and analyse these images at light speed," adds Runesson. "It will allow users of the warehouse to effortlessly browse satellite and aerial photographs online at or near original data resolutions."
With the instant access to these images that ORION will provide, the pace of research will increase dramatically, as will the range and scope of forestry management access by institutions across the province and beyond. ORION will also enable real time spatial analysis online for customized map production and queries.
"Once fully established, the Legacy Forest will form an ideal base for investigating the effects of forest management on sustainability from the point of view of all forest values" said Robin Reilly, Chair of the Legacy Forest Education and Technology Transfer Committee. "The Legacy Forest will greatly enhance educational programs at public schools, universities, and colleges. It will also be ideal for providing a unique continuing education experience for forestry practitioners, other forest users, and the public-at-large.”
Reilly adds that ORION will contribute to the economic development of Northwestern Ontario and potentially serve as a model for intensive forest management at the provincial, national, and possibly even international level.
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