With continuing support from the Department of Energy’s Office of Biological and Environmental Research, collaboration with Oak Ridge National Laboratory has led to the creation of the largest global database of root traits. These efforts are ongoing; the team continues to incorporate additional data streams, both new and old, and facilitate even greater ease of use for this freely available, public resource.
Despite its young age, FRED has already led to new analyses and insights into fine-root ecology and now serves as the backbone of a new, internationally funded working group linking root traits to ecosystem function (sROOT funded by iDiv).
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