Introduction
The maturity of the LTER program in its third decade offers new opportunities and challenges for interdisciplinary research on the interaction between biophysical and socioeconomic systems across regional, national and oceanic boundaries.  Brief introductions and links to more information about current Coweeta LTER cross-site synthesis efforts are provided below.

USGS Hydrologic Data in Near-Real-Time
(Coweeta LTER and Georgia Coastal Ecosystems LTER Collaboration)
USGS hydrologic data is harvested from five stream locations located in proximity to the Coweeta Hydrologic Laboratory in western North Carolina.  Parameters retrieved include daily maximum discharge, daily minimum discharge, daily mean discharge, daily maximum gage height, daily minimum gauge height and daily mean gage height.

AGTRANS
By creating several transition matrices, we are testing alternative conceptual models about how patterns of protection influence and are influenced by surrounding landscape transition, mediated through decision-makers and the public. This is a phase project of the AgTrans BioComplexity collaboration.

In keeping with the interdisciplinary nature of the AGTRANS project, six different LTER sites are participating in the study. Cross comparisons will be conducted with sites in Mexico (Yaqui Valley Study) and France (Archaeomedes Project).

Climate (CLIMDB) & Hydrology (HYDRODB)
Centralized servers provide open access to long-term meteorological and stream flow records from a collection of research sites.  Coweeta LTER, along with thirty-eight other LTER, USGS, and USDA Forest Service sites, contributes climate and hydrological data.

Geographic distribution of sites contributing:
LTER Sites | USDA Forest Service Sites
 

LIDET - Long-Term Intersite Decomposition Experiment Team
The primary objective of this study is to examine the control that substrate quality and climate have on patterns of long-term decomposition and nitrogen accumulation in above- and below-ground fine litter. Of particular interest will be to examine the degree these two factors control the formation of stable organic matter and nitrogen after extensive decay.
 

LINX II - Lotic Intersite Nitrogen Experiment
The Lotic Intersite Nitrogen Experiment is a collaborative study of nitrogen cycling in streams involving simulation modeling, field tracer 15N) additions, and intersite comparison.  The central hypothesis is that the considerable variability among streams in uptake, retention, and cycling of nitrogen is controlled by key hydrodynamic, chemical, and metabolic characteristics that determine water retention, degree of nitrogen deficiency, and energy flow through food webs in stream ecosystems.
 

SAISON
Coweeta LTER and AHPA are collaborating on the comparative historical ecology of the Little Tennessee River Basin in western North Carolina and the Saison River Basin in the western Pyrenees on the French-Spanish border (right). This collaboration emerges from the growing recognition within and beyond the LTER Network that knowledge of historical patterns and processes provide evidence of reference conditions needed to inform land management and guide the formulation of public policies.
 

ACSC - Advancing Conservation in a Social Context
Coweeta LTER Information Management provided web design and database programming in support of this MacArthur Foundation funded project based in the Department of Anthropology at the University of Georgia. 

About ACSC:  The issue of how to more effectively practice conservation in a context that is unmistakably and inextricably social has emerged as a dominant unresolved question in conservation. Advancing Conservation in a Social Context is an 18 month project (January 2005-July 2006) devoted to developing an interdisciplinary research initiative to reexamine these complex ecological and social relationships.