There is nothing more important at this moment in time than the ability to sustain life on our planet.
The study of biodiversity provides a critical window into the ecosystems and environments that support all living organisms. What we can learn through the study of biodiversity may ultimately be the key to continuation of life on earth. The missions of the collaborative are detailed below:
The center celebrates the diversity of living organisms and seeks to promote further understanding of the ways humans can help to preserve the varied natural environments that allow plants, animals and microbes to survive and thrive.
The center exists as a collaborative hub that facilitates interdisciplinary research among plant and animal biologists, and scholars across a wide range of fields.
The center aims to bring together the world’s top minds in the field of biodiversity in an international collaborative that transcends geographic and political boundaries to address the most pressing issues facing humankind – the ability to sustain life on earth.
Living Earth Collaborative is the premier science-driven consortium engaged in leading edge biodiversity research and education. Through research and training, the consortium develops new approaches to biodiversity and conservation science that foster the next generation of scientists and provides tangible benefits for applying results to conserving biodiversity at local to global scales.
Why Biodiversity?
- The IUCN and WWF identifies climate change and biodiversity loss as twin crises. The combined impact of unprecedented change to Earth systems by humans, together with a human-caused rapidly changing climate, means that up to 1 million species are at imminent risk of extinction.
- According to research in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the Earth is undergoing a biological annihilation.
Source: Ceballos, G. & Ehrlich, P. (2023). Mutilation of the tree of life via mass extinction of animal genera - Global populations of fish, birds, mammals, amphibians and reptiles declined by 73 percent between 1970 and 2020.
Source: WWF Living Planet Report 2024 - 45% of all known flowering plants and three in four of the world’s unknown plant species is threatened with extinction, putting supplies of food and medicines at risk.
Source: 2023 State of the World’s Plants report, Royal Botanic Gardens Kew - Although extinction is a natural phenomenon, occurring at background rate of one to five species a year, scientists estimate we’re now losing species at 1,000 to 10,000 times the background rate, with literally dozens going extinct every day.
Source: Chivian, E. and A. Bernstein (eds.) Sustaining life: How human health depends on biodiversity. Center for Health and the Global Environment. Oxford University Press, New York. - IPBES, WWF, and IUCN identified five threats responsible for the current biodiversity crisis: biological invasions, climate change, habitat loss and degradation, overexploitation, and pollution. Source: IPBES. (2019).Global assessment report on biodiversity and ecosystem services of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services.