On today’s episode of the Mongabay Newscast, we welcome Sue Palminteri, editor of Mongabay’s WildTech site as well as a scientist and director of the biodiversity and wildlife solutions program at RESOLVE, a Washington, D.C.-based NGO.

Sue fills us in on the history of the WildTech site and why it is important to highlight the high- and low-tech solutions to challenges in conservation efforts. She also shares with us some of the most interesting technologies and trends that she sees as having the biggest potential to transform the way we go about conserving Earth’s natural resources and wildlife.

Also on the program, we feature a live-taped conversation with Jonathan Thompson and Clarisse Hart, two scientists with the Harvard Forest, a long-term ecological research project of Harvard University.

A few Mongabay staffers were recently invited to speak at the journalism school at UMass Amherst, which happens to be fairly close to the Harvard Forest out in Western Massachusetts. While we were there, we took the opportunity to sit down with Thompson and Hart in order to discuss their work in front of a live studio audience of journalism students. Guest co-host and Mongabay editor Becky Kessler helps lead a conversation about Thompson and Hart’s work, including a study they released looking at multiple scenarios for the future of Massachusetts’ forests that they say changed the way they approach research altogether.

Here’s this episode’s top news:

• Will Madagascar lose its most iconic primate?
• “Endangered species to declare?” Europe’s understudied bushmeat trade
• A Czech zoo is dehorning its rhinos
• Damage to Raja Ampat 12 times higher than previously thought
• Amazon land speculators poised to gain control of vast public lands

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Follow Mike Gaworecki on Twitter: @mikeg2001

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