This award provides partial support for improvements to the Mpala Research Centre (MRC) that will improve site access and safety. The enhancements include improved access to and safety within the most frequented parts of the landscape, namely, the large-scale exclosure experiments funded by NSF, and the campsite, which provides accommodation for large groups of students on courses, and increasingly, for delegates to workshops with research and conservation themes. It will also provide for sheltered parking for station research vehicles and enhanced rain water collection. Equipment to be purchased will provide enhanced archiving and retrieval of environmental monitoring data, and an updated inventory of satellite imagery of the 22,000 hectare MRC property and of neighboring habitats. The MRC lies at the core of the Ewaso ecosystem, a vast and diverse savanna maintaining prodigious wildlife populations, much of it not formally protected. The Centre is administered as a Trust, in partnership with Trustees that include Princeton University, the Smithsonian Institution, the National Museums of Kenya and the Kenya Wildlife service. Work at the MRC advances research in the environmental, biological, and conservation sciences, and also educates the next generation of environmental scientists by melding classroom learning with practical field experiences. Residential and scientific facilities are available for up to thirty-six scientists and students, including labs equipped for basic DNA analysis. In the last 12 years, more than fifty projects have been conducted at the MRC, including seven NSF funded projects currently underway, and another eight NSF supported projects that have been completed during the last five years. Because MRC has become central to the research and education of Kenyan scientists, including students of all grades and university levels and, as well, non-traditional students who work for governmental agencies, the improvements will continue the efforts of the four trustee organizations that manage the Center to enhance the capabilities of the next generation of scientific leaders world wide.
