Only through understanding diversity and the factors that promote it will we be able to mount an effective response to the challenges facing the environment in the 21st century. Many significant questions remain unanswered:

* How many species are there?
* How sensitive are ecosystems to disruption?
* How will climate change affect biodiversity?
* Can we devise sustainable means of feeding the expanding human population while still retaining extensive natural areas?

The answer to these, and other, questions is an all-embracing scientific enterprise. It involves experts in universities and museums, amateur enthusiasts, and interested and alert naturalists the world over.

Supporting World Class Expertise
Government funding has long neglected a fundamental repository of information on the natural world: the expert - the individual who, for example, can identify instantly all known species of bombyliid fly and who knows at once whether a new specimen belongs to a species hitherto unknown to science. In this area, a little money goes a very long way. The Foundation will encourage young scientists to take up the challenge of acquiring this kind of detailed -- and essential - knowledge.

Bringing technology to ecology
Ecology has too long been seen as a low-tech, beards-and-rubber-boots kind of science. In fact, technology - satellite imagery in environmental assessment, imaging techniques and DNA sequencing for species identification - can and will play a central role in ecological research. The Foundation will facilitate the transition of biodiversity science from low to high tech by awarding scholarships to scientists in advanced technologies.

Thinking long term

Too much ecological research is short term: the tenure system in universities mandates that scientists "publish or perish". That mentality does not mesh well with many of the timescales ecology operates on -- a ten year forest population cycle is unlikely therefore to be a popular research topic among ambitious field biologists. The Foundation will support cost effective ways like the BioBlitz to monitor areas of ecological importance over time and publish those integrated data sets on the web.

Marrying science and citizen science

One of the Foundation's primary goals is to capitalize on the vast potential of citizen science. Naturalists the world over can, via the web, contribute useful data on species in the wild. We will formalize mechanisms for contributing via our BioBlitz program that encourages people to inventory local habitats of interest. Scientists should come to recognize the power of citizen science of this kind: the potential to generate data in quantities unthinkable in traditional science is remarkable.