Ad hoc instrumentation methods in ecological studies produce highly biased temperature measurements

In any study which tries to scale grounded field data to a regional perspective, using (as-much-as-possible) unbiased methods is necessary so that data points are comparable across regions.  A good recent paper experimentally looked at the best air temperature sensor design:


They experimentally compared 11 different sensor brand and shield combinations to weather station data, and found that quite a few methods had a positive bias. It’s not something we haven’t known is a danger (positive bias due to inadequate/improperly designed shielding), but this is a nice way to standardize methods with some experimental backing behind it.