The contribution of Citizens’ Observatories to validation of satellite‐retrieved soil moisture products

The GROW Observatory (GROW) will create a sustainable citizen platform and community to generate, share and utilise information on land, soil and water resources at a resolution hitherto not previously considered. The European Space Agency’s Sentinel‐1 is the first mission capable of providing high‐resolution soil moisture information, but a proper validation of Sentinel data remains a challenge given the scarcity of available in situ reference measurements. Establishment of a dense network of in situ measurement can bridge the gap in spatial resolution between in situ and satellite‐based soil moisture measurements enabling validation and calibration of ground and remotely measured soil moisture observations. The potential exists to answer scientific questions including the validity of satellite data, the impact of climate change on land management thus supporting the needs of growers and integrating citizen and scientific research to be more directly applicable and relevant

Surreptitious symbiosis: engagement between activists and NGOs

Based on research conducted in Athens, Cairo, London and Yerevan the article analyses the relationship between activists engaged in street protests or direct action since 2011 and NGOs. It examines how activists relate to NGOs and whether it is possible to do sustained activism to bring about social change without becoming part of a ‘civil society industry’. The article argues that while at first glance NGOs seem disconnected from recent street activism, and activists distance themselves from NGOs, the situation is more complicated than meets the eye. It contends that the boundaries between the formal NGOs and informal groups of activists is blurred and there is much cross-over and collaboration. The article demonstrates and seeks to explain this phenomenon, which we call surreptitious symbiosis, from the micro- perspective of individual activists and NGO staff. Finally, we discuss whether this surreptitious symbiosis can be sustained and sketch three scenarios for the future

Citizen science as seen by scientists: Methodological, epistemological and ethical dimensions

Citizen science as a way of communicating science and doing public engagement has over the past decade become the focus of considerable hopes and expectations. It can be seen as a win–win situation, where scientists get help from the public and the participants get a public engagement experience that involves them in real and meaningful scientific research. In this paper we present the results of a series of qualitative interviews with scientists who participated in the ‘OPAL’ portfolio of citizen science projects that has been running in England since 2007: What were their experiences of participating in citizen science? We highlight two particular sets of issues that our participants have voiced, methodological/epistemological and ethical issues. While we share the general enthusiasm over citizen science, we hope that the research in this paper opens up more debate over the potential pitfalls of citizen science as seen by the scientists themselves

Capturing the sounds of an urban greenspace

Acoustic data can be a source of important information about events and the environment in modern cities. To date, much of the focus has been on monitoring noise pollution, but the urban soundscape contains a rich variety of signals about both human and natural phenomena. We describe the CitySounds project, which has installed enclosed sensor kits at several locations across a heavily used urban greenspace in the city of Edinburgh. The acoustic monitoring components regularly capture short clips in real-time of both ultrasonic and audible noises, for example encompassing bats, birds and other wildlife, traffic, and human. The sounds are complemented by collecting other data from sensors, such as temperature and relative humidity. To ensure privacy and compliance with relevant legislation, robust methods render completely unintelligible any traces of voice or conversation that may incidentally be overheard by the sensors. We have adopted a variety of methods to encourage community engagement with the audio data and to communicate the richness of urban soundscapes to a general audience