by Naveen
Recently, a few of our group members went to Muir Woods National Park in California. Muir Woods National Park is well known for its huge red wood trees. The park is continuously engaged in preserving the trees and identifying potential risks to the trees.
The team members had a chance to talk to the park rangers and talk about out research project. We learned that there is a whole research team at the park dedicated to trying to predict when certain trees will fall. There are multiple steps that the research team goes through. First, they record several characteristics such as height, width, thickness, girth, decay, etc. for EVERY SINGLE TREE in the national park. Then they analyze the data collected and possibly sort them into numerous categories. Afterward, they compare the data with fallen trees and try to find trends, similarities and differences. Using this, they attempt to predict when and how various trees will fall. To prevent damaging other trees, the park will cut down certain parts of the unstable trees.
This was a great inspiration for us, we think we are taking this a step further and proposing that the science behind this should be made available to all people possibly using a smartphone app.
The team members had a chance to talk to the park rangers and talk about out research project. We learned that there is a whole research team at the park dedicated to trying to predict when certain trees will fall. There are multiple steps that the research team goes through. First, they record several characteristics such as height, width, thickness, girth, decay, etc. for EVERY SINGLE TREE in the national park. Then they analyze the data collected and possibly sort them into numerous categories. Afterward, they compare the data with fallen trees and try to find trends, similarities and differences. Using this, they attempt to predict when and how various trees will fall. To prevent damaging other trees, the park will cut down certain parts of the unstable trees.
This was a great inspiration for us, we think we are taking this a step further and proposing that the science behind this should be made available to all people possibly using a smartphone app.