Biodiversity Institute for Conservation Synthesis

Month: July 2025

Rethinking ‘Big Data’: Small Datasets, Big Ecological Insights

Rethinking ‘Big Data’: Small Datasets, Big Ecological Insights

You don’t always need massive datasets to learn something important about nature. While modern ecology often focuses on large-scale “big data,” a recent study carried out in part by BICS director Dr. Robert Hanner, shows that smaller, less-than-perfect datasets can still reveal important patterns—if analyzed carefully. Researchers examined how changes in habitat and interactions between species affect fish communities, using data from electrofishing surveys and habitat measurements at four sites where the environment had been experimentally altered.

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