From Gizmodo
Your Nature Photos Are Doing More Science Than You Think
By Ellyn Lapointe
With a smartphone in hand, anyone can be a naturalist. Apps like iNaturalist have surged in popularity over the last 15 years, with millions using them to document wildlife around the world. A new study shows that these observations contribute a deluge of data to scientific research.
Use of iNaturalist has skyrocketed since its launch in 2008. This citizen science database now contains more than 200 million observations logged by over 3 million users globally, according to research published Monday, July 28, in the journal BioScience. This study is the first to comprehensively quantify how everyday people are contributing to biodiversity science through iNaturalist, coauthor Corey Callaghan, a global change ecologist at the University of Florida, told Gizmodo. He and his colleagues conducted a review of thousands of research articles, finding that the number of peer-reviewed studies using iNaturalist data surged more than tenfold in the last five years.
Beyond documenting where species occur, the photos uploaded to iNaturalist offer a rich source of biological information—capturing habitat, species coloration, behavior, and more,” lead author Brittany Mason, data management analyst in Callaghan’s research group, told Gizmodo in an email. “Researchers are increasingly using this imagery data as a valuable source of ecological and behavioral data...”
iNaturalist was conceived by MIMS alumni Jessica Kline Ken-ichi Ueda, and Nathan Agrin as a 2008 final project. The project is still run by Ueda and recently received the Heinz Award.
