Bozeman, Montana -- NASA's Earth Science Enterprise recently awarded support for a broad-based weed-mapping project in Montana's Madison County. This is the first direct support from NASA for the project, which began in 1999.

The project brings together more than a dozen public and private partners, including Dow AgroSciences and (Ted) Turner Enterprises, to evaluate the utility of remote sensing for mapping, and eventually managing, noxious weeds like Spotted Knapweed and Leafy Spurge. These noxious weeds are spreading and replacing native plants at an alarming rate in the American West, according to weed scientists. Roger Sheley, Montana State University (MSU) weed scientist and a principal investigator on the project, calls knapweed and spurge the leading environmental menaces in the region.

NASA's support will be directed through Positive Systems of Whitefish, Mont., a company that provides remote sensing imagery and services to the environmental, agricultural, and scientific community. With the space agency¹s support, scientists will be able to compare commercially available data tools with methods employed by MSU. According to MSU's principal investigator, Rick Lawrence, "an improvement of even a few percentage points in the predictive capability of the data, would improve its utility and value to everyone." Participants hope to make remote sensing an ally in the war against noxious weeds.

The project was organized by MSU TechLink, a technology transfer organization based in Bozeman, and brings together the resources of several organizations to help bring space-based technologies to Earth. "There have been lots of advances in remote sensing and interpretive research, but noxious weed managers on large public and private lands are not yet adopting these technologies" said TechLink's Dan Swanson, director of agricultural and environmental initiatives. "We hope that this project can help move the technology in that direction."

TechLink is located at Montana State University and funded by the Department of Defense and NASA to link companies in Montana and the surrounding region with federal laboratories for joint research and technology transfer.

Contacts:
Dan Swanson
MSU TechLink
(406) 994-7736
dss@montana.edu

Dale Johnson
Positive Systems
(406) 862-7745
positive@possys.com

Rick Lawrence
MSU
(406) 994-5409
rickl@montana.edu

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