Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Mapping Forest Structure In Mississippi Using Lidar Remote Sensing, Nitant Rai

Theses and Dissertations

This study aimed at evaluating the agreement of spaceborne Light Detection and Ranging (lidar) ICESat-2 canopy height with Airborne Laser Scanning (ALS) derived canopy height to inform about the performance of ICESat-2 canopy height metrics and understand its uncertainties and utilities. The agreement was assessed for different forest types, physiographic regions, a range of percent canopy cover, and diverse disturbance histories. Results of this study suggest that best agreements are found using strong beam data collected at night for canopy height retrieval using ICESat-2. The ICESat-2 showed great potential for estimating canopy heights, particularly in evergreen forests with high canopy …

Geologic Mapping Of The Sparta 7.5-Minute Quadrangle In Northern Mississippi Via Remote Sensing, Traditional Geologic Survey, And Applied Geospatial Information Systems Methods, Rayford Dean Parnell

Theses and Dissertations

Traditional geologic mapping involves substantial time and labor in the field as geologic contacts are manually examined and interpreted. The processes of mapping geologic contacts can be condensed into a quicker and less laborious process using advances in remote sensing and GIS (geospatial information systems), including increased resolution and computerized data management and interpretation. Application of these advances reduces the costs and time of geologic mapping. The Sparta 7.5-minute quadrangle provides a mostly unaltered view of regional Paleocene and Upper Cretaceous geology due to its rural locale, lack of development, and stream topography. Recently LiDAR (Light Detection And Ranging) survey …

A Multi-Method Exploration Of Health Disparities And Covid-19 Incidence And Mortality In The United States, S M Asger Ali

Theses and Dissertations

The 21^st century experienced several health crises, especially in the form of infectious disease outbreaks such as the SARS outbreak in 2003, the H1N1 in 2009, and Ebola outbreaks in 2013. However, none has produced a worldwide socio-economic and health impact compared to the recent pandemic, known as COVID-19. As of October 4, 2022, more than 614 million cases with 6 million deaths have been reported worldwide. The United States is currently in the leading position with more than 98 million cases and 1 million deaths. The pandemic, however, did not impact the entire region similarly, and the infections …

Precision Weed Management Based On Uas Image Streams, Machine Learning, And Pwm Sprayers, Jason Allen Davis

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Weed populations in agricultural production fields are often scattered and unevenly distributed; however, herbicides are broadcast across fields evenly. Although effective, in the case of post-emergent herbicides, exceedingly more pesticides are used than necessary. A novel weed detection and control workflow was evaluated targeting Palmer amaranth in soybean (Glycine max) fields. High spatial resolution (0.4 cm) unmanned aircraft system (UAS) image streams were collected, annotated, and used to train 16 object detection convolutional neural networks (CNNs; RetinaNet, Faster R-CNN, Single Shot Detector, and YOLO v3) each trained on imagery with 0.4, 0.6, 0.8, and 1.2 cm spatial resolutions. Models were …

Spatiotemporal Change Detection Of The Alpine Meadows At Holcomb Valley, San Bernardino Mountain National Forest, Using Gis And Remote Sensing Techniques, Rama Ewing

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Holcomb Valley, with a general elevation between 2200-2257m, is in the Northeast of Big Bear Lake in the San Bernardino Mountains. Holcomb Valley is covered by Alpine meadows, unlike most mountain landscapes, which are rarely found in Mediterranean climates such as California. The cultural-environmental history of the San Bernardino Mountains in the past century speaks of intense anthropogenic activities such as timbering, grazing, gold mining, and extreme climate changes (i.e., drought, fires, floods). A study is conducted to identify and calculate the changes in the Alpine meadows at Holcomb Valley. The climatical data has been acquired to compute and visualize …

Flood Hazard And Risk Analyses In The Republic Of Panama: A Case Study From The Juan Diaz River Watershed In Panama City, Virgilio De Jesus Quintero

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Flooding is the natural hazard with most occurrences in Panama. Its frequency and magnitude have increased over the years. This dissertation analyzes Panama’s flood activity in order to better understand flood hazards, the current evolution of Panamanian perceptions of flood risk, and the incorporation of indigenous knowledge used to mitigate flood hazards. The first chapter developed a baseline of past and current flood inventory in Panama, which required the use of flood historical data, thematic cartography, and Geographic Information Science (GIS). This chapter shows Panama has experienced floods in varying degrees. Through the spatial and temporal distribution of floods from …

Spatial Analysis Of Housing Vacancy : Time Lag, Spillover Effects, And Spatial Heterogeneity, Yutian Feng

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

The housing vacancy issue has long been a concern for community development and urban planning, especially in old industrial cities since the second half of the 20th century. Following the subprime lending crisis in 2007, the problem of housing vacancy again attracts attention as it causes problems like housing inequity, neighborhood redevelopment, and spatial justice in most U.S. cities. This dissertation systematically builds up an analytical framework to explore the mechanism of housing vacancy, using Buffalo urban area as a case study. Firstly, the research pays attention to the factors contributing to housing vacancy. The dissertation also investigates if there …

Green On The Map - The Influence Of Conservation Easements On The Naturalness Of Landscapes In The United States, Nakisha Fouch

All Dissertations

Large protected areas have long been the cornerstone of conservation biology, however, in an era branded by the human dominance of ecosystems, regional landscape structure and function are often a consequence of accumulated land-use decisions that may or may not include a nod to conservation planning. With underrepresentation of habitats in publicly protected areas, attention has focused on the function of alternative land conservation mechanisms. Private conservation easements (CEs) have proliferated in the United States, yet assessing landscape-level function is confounded by holder and donor intent, national and regional policy, regional landscape contexts, varying extents, resolution, and temporal scale. Over …

Species Data And Vector Modeling: Evaluating Datasets For Improved Models Of Ixodes Ricinus Tick Distribution In Europe Under A Changing Climate, Steven Jones

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

To increase capacity for monitoring and surveillance of tick-borne diseases, publicly available tick distribution and climate change datasets are required to create accurate predictive distribution models. It is difficult, however, to assess model accuracy and utility when using incomplete datasets.  The more recent development of comprehensive tick databases for Europe and availability of climate change scenarios from multiple IPCC Assessment Reports allows for improved modeling efforts. Multiple tick datasets were combined and three climate change projections were compared by predicting current and future distributions of Ixodes ricinus ticks in Europe using the MaxEnt species distribution model. Overall, much of Europe …

Orbital Mapping Of Seasonal And Yearly Changes In Co2 And Water Ice On The Southern Polar Cap Of Mars, Victoria Michell Ann Karnes

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This research exhibits a new foundation for the rates of change in CO2 and water ice on the southern polar cap of Mars, where the annual precipitation cycles are known to fluctuate seasonally between the north and south pole, based on observations from the Compact Reconnaissance Imaging Spectrometer (CRISM). The conventional belief is that both CO2 ice and water ice on the southern polar cap condenses and evaporates over the course of a Martian year (MY), condensing during the Martian spring and summer and evaporating during the Martian fall and winter. With this theory in mind, CO2 and water ice …

Access Beyond Geographic Accessibility: Understanding Opportunities To Human Needs In A Physical-Virtual World, Jimmy Feng

Doctoral Dissertations

Access to basic human needs, such as food and healthcare, is conceptually understood to be comprised of multiple spatial and aspatial dimensions. However, research in this area has traditionally been explored with spatial accessibility measures that almost exclusively focus on just two dimensions. Namely, the availability of resources, services, and facilities, and the accessibility or ease to which locations of these opportunities can be reached with existing land-use and transport systems under temporal constraints and considering individual characteristics of people. These calculated measures are insufficient in holistically capturing available opportunities as they ignore other components, such as the emergence of …

Estimation Of Economic Risk From Coastal Natural Hazards In Louisiana, Rubayet Bin Mostafiz

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Louisiana, U.S.A., is among the most vulnerable areas globally to coastal natural hazards, with risk vulnerability likely increasing. The risks associated with non-tropical-cyclone hazards in Louisiana’s coastal zone have been understudied. This research enhances present and future (i.e., 2050) Louisiana risk assessment using locally-weighted, model-based hazard frequency/intensity and population projections.

Results suggest that property risks associated with extreme cold temperature and tornado are and will remain costlier than those for hail and lightning. Property risks of extreme cold temperature and hail are projected to decrease with the expected warming temperatures, with those of all four of these hazards peaking in …

A Gis Analysis To Identify Historical, Contemporary, And Spatial Housing Discrimination In Denver, Colorado, Ian Sharkey

Geography and the Environment: Graduate Student Capstones

This study analyzes the relationship between housing discrimination and equity within the City of Denver. This study creates a discrimination index by combining (1) historical Discrimination, (2) contemporary segregation, and (3) housing inequity data into an index to compare the Denver Department of Health and the Environment (DDPHE) 2020 equity index using a local bivariate analysis. This study found a negative linear relationship between the created and Denver equity indexes. The variables used for the discrimination index can explain some of the relationships, but future studies should use more variables for a discrimination index.

Using Gis To Identify Barriers To Access On The Rtd W Line In Denver, Colorado, Tristan Johnson

Geography and the Environment: Graduate Student Capstones

Denver, Colorado has a long history of public transportation usage beginning with horse-drawn streetcars in 1871. As the automobile began to flourish however, the use of public transportation has languished. In 2013, the W light rail line opened serving the West Denver area. As Denver has moved toward a more transit-oriented growth model, this rail line can create a more vibrant future. Using GIS, a better understanding of the barriers to access for light rail travel is obtained and considering key variables outputs are created to assist policy makers in utilizing the W line. By using GIS to address population …

Understanding Changes To Human Mobility Patterns In Ontario, Canada During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Ben Klar

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

Transportation research has shown that socio-demographic factors affect people’s mobility patterns. During the COVID-19 pandemic, some of these effects have changed in accordance with changing mobility needs adapting to the pandemic, including restrictions on in-person gatherings, closure of in-person businesses and working from home. We investigate two gaps in current knowledge in this area of transportation research: to what extent the association between socio-demographic factors and mobility metrics have changed, and how these associations vary across geographic space. We also investigate how closely Ontario’s Public Health Unit boundaries, based on which pandemic restrictions were applied, reflect actual travel regions, and …

Expulsive Greening: A Cross-Sectional Analysis Of Green Gentrification In The Resilience Paradigm, Brooklyn 2010–2020, Rose Jimenez

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Background: This project analyzes the spatial coincidence between gentrification typologies and urban greening in Brooklyn, New York from 2010 to 2020. Assets formed under the NYC Green Infrastructure Program were chosen as a proxy for urban greening to represent the spatial practice specifically within the 21st-century climate change resilience paradigm of development. Methods: First, five indexes measuring variations of economic and demographic conditions related to gentrification were applied to Brooklyn for comparative analysis: NOAA’s Social Vulnerability Indicators of Gentrification Pressure, The NYC Heat Vulnerability Index, The Small Area Index of Gentrification, Typologies of Gentrification and Displacement, and The Housing Risk …

Centers Of Community: A Spatial Analysis Of The Mid-19th Century Populaton Residing On Beacon Hill, Boston, Ma, Justin Malcolm

Graduate Masters Theses

The first Black church constructed in Boston, and the oldest extant Black church building in America, the African Meeting House was located on the North Slope of Beacon Hill; the predominant residence of Boston’s Black population during the nineteenth century. The African Meeting House has been the subject of several important archaeological investigations. In 1840, a schism within the African Meeting House congregation resulted in the establishment of the Twelfth Baptist Church. Historical contexts suggest that this neighborhood was highly segregated. A geographic and statistical analysis of the unique 1850 Boston City Census, which was made to yield spatial contexts …

Measuring The Morphologic Response Of Braided Rivers To Lateral Constriction, Victoria Barlow

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation Repository

The aim of this thesis is to understand the morphologic changes to a set of historically braided rivers that have been narrowed. Braided rivers from the agriculturally developed Canterbury Plains, New Zealand, were studied from a period prior to much development (mid-1900s) to the present. Narrowing of channels, decreased braiding intensity, and loss of braided planforms were determined based on aerial imagery, changing the geography of braiding along all rivers. Channel width and count were statistically correlated and show the predictability of braiding change based on narrowing. Reaches with initially wide channels require more narrowing to induce a simplification of …

Quantifying Spatial Heterogeneity Of Wild Blueberries And Crop Water Stress Monitoring Using Remote Sensing Technologies, Kallol Barai

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The wild blueberry is one of the major crops of Maine, with significant economic value and potential health benefits. Due to global climate change, drought impacts have been increasing significantly in recent years in the northeast region of the USA, causing significant economic losses in the agricultural sectors. It has been predicted to increase further in the future. Changing patterns of the elevated atmospheric temperatures, increased rainfall variabilities, and more frequent drought events have made the wild blueberry industry of Maine vulnerable, suggesting the adoption of novel approaches to mitigate the negative impacts of global climate changes. Also, wild blueberry …

Crime Attractors In Sin City? A Pre/Post Test Of Crime Patterns And Police Enforcement Around Recreational Marijuana Facilities, Joshua Donnelly

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The federalist system in the United States has created criminal opportunities within jurisdictions that have approved recreational marijuana facilities (RMFs). These facilities have characteristics that are attractive for motivated offenders including marijuana and marijuana-related tangible goods. Through ArcGIS, this research examined the crime patterns and police enforcement patterns that occurred within a 288-meter street-network buffer around RMFs through a pre/post-test exploratory design in the Las Vegas area. The time periods examined were 2015 to 2016 (pre-legalization), and 2018 to 2019 (post-legalization). Calls for service data were used to demonstrate both crime and enforcement patterns. Furthermore, facilities were classified into “local …

Changes Of Winter Severity In Arkansas During 1901-2100, Christian Garcia

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The objective of this study was to quantify the winter severity in a way that was reproduceable and easy to understand. The Accumulated Winter Severity Seasonal Index (AWSSI) was chosen for this reason and was used to quantify winter severity by season across the state of Arkansas. The variables that go into the AWSSI calculation are maximum daily temperature, minimum daily temperature, daily snowfall, and daily snow depth. When the snowfall and snow depth were missing, they can be estimated using daily temperature and precipitation. Then the estimated snowfall and snow depth can be subsequently used to quantify the winter …

Covid-19 Renters And Housing Instability: Combatting The Eviction Epidemic During The Covid-19 Pandemic In Knox County, Tennessee, Samantha B. Myers-Miller

Masters Theses

COVID-19 has exacerbated preexisting inequities in Knox County, Tennessee. The disruption to employment caused by the pandemic has imposed a great financial burden for many individuals who rent housing. The primary relief that was afforded to renters during the pandemic was enabled by a federal eviction moratorium order, where covered renters could defer payments to avoid eviction while the moratorium was in effect. Some additional rental assistance was provided to local governments through the federal CARES Act pandemic relief package. Despite these provisions, many people experienced housing crises in Knox County, where over 3,000 renters have faced eviction filing from …

Exchange And Social Interaction In The Tennessee River Valley: A Geospatial Approach To The Analysis Of Late Archaic Archaeological Sites, Justin S. Bailey

Masters Theses

The cultural manifestation known as the Shell Mound Archaic persisted in the lower Midwest and Midsouth region of the Eastern United States for over four millennia beginning in the Middle Archaic ca. 8900 cal BP and terminating at the end of the Late Archaic ca 3200 cal BP. A geospatial approach is applied to the analysis of exotic material exchange of the Late Archaic (ca. 5800-3200 cal BP) to assess how foraging peoples in the Tennessee River Valley interacted and persisted during this time. Exotic material items manufactured from copper, marine shell, steatite, and other nonlocal materials demonstrate distinct spatial …

Creating A Public Space For Georeferencing Sanborn Maps: A Louisiana Case Study, Adam Cox

LSU Master's Theses

As institutional archives digitize their historical map collections and make them publicly available online, new methods for engaging with these materials emerge. Georeferencing the maps transforms their content from static images to dynamic map overlays, and allows for the extraction of geographic data like building footprints or place name coordinates. Many organizations have turned to crowdsourcing to georeference their large holdings, and this thesis approaches crowdsourced georeferencing from the perspective of participatory heritage, taking much inspiration from the idea of the archival commons. To test these ideas, a new extension was created for GeoNode—an open source geospatial content management system—that …

Gis Automated Delineation And Analysis Of Cancer Service Areas In The United States, Changzhen Wang

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Delineating a meaningful and reliable geographic unit pertaining to cancer care is essential in examining geographic variations in cancer care for better analysis, management, and planning. Public health researchers have devoted great efforts to defining various service areas, which; however, lack scientific rigor or are unrepresentative of the highly specialized cancer care markets, and their methods have become obsolete in the era of big data and high geo-computation. This study develops the “Spatially Constrained Leiden (ScLeiden)” method, a network community detection algorithm in Geographic Information Systems (GIS), and applies it to delineate a series of coherent cancer service …

Human-Centered Avalanche Susceptibility Mapping, Lindsey L. Rotche

Geography ETDs

With backcountry winter travel increasing in popularity, the importance of accessible avalanche safety information is crucial. Widely accessible avalanche backcountry maps use slope shading to show where avalanches are likely to start. Instead of focusing on the hazard of an avalanche starting in a specific location, this project shifted the cartographic emphasis of avalanche susceptibility maps to show risk to a human traveling in the terrain. I developed a methodology to incorporate possible avalanche runouts, terrain traps, and connected slopes while reducing false certainty of the visualization. To provide a more comprehensive representation of susceptible terrain, I integrated aspect, distance …

A Gis Suitability Model Evaluating Habitat Characteristics Influencing Beaver (Castor Canadensis) Lodge Site Selection And Lodge Occupancy In Central Adirondacks, New York, Amanda K. Jacobs

Theses - ALL

The North American beaver (Castor canadensis) represents a quintessential example of an "ecosystem engineer." Yet the species' landscape-scale impacts on hydrology, geomorphology, and ecosystem ecology are not uniformly distributed through landscapes or time. Understanding beaver lodge site selection and lodge fidelity through time can help to predict where the greatest effects of beaver activity may occur. In this research project, I seek to understand the relationships between beaver habitat suitability, the habitat variables that currently define suitable areas, and lodge occupancy over time. Using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to model habitat suitability, I use hydrologic, vegetative, and physiographic variables to …

Why, New York City? Gauging The Quality Of Life Through The Thoughts Of Tweeters, Sheryl Williams

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

As a resource for social data, Twitter’s platform has been used to measure the quality of life through sentiment analysis. This capstone project explores another methodological technique—querying Twitter data around specific keyword terms to determine dominant topics, word patterns, and sentiment leanings in a geographical area. Focusing on New York City and Los Angeles for comparative analysis, the keyword term “why” will be used to build a Python analysis around topic modeling and sentiment analysis. Using this approach, the analysis reveals social and cultural differences, the overall sentiment of tweets, and subjects of interest to tweeters.

GitHub Repository for all …

Our Streets: Increasing Equity In Active Transportation Planning Through Community Outreach, Jordan Hoy

Master's Projects and Capstones

ABSTRACT Significant research has demonstrated that active transportation infrastructure is essential for the growth and livability of San Francisco: it increases access to economic opportunities, promotes overall improved public health, encourages mobility without contributing to roadway congestion, prevents traffic injuries and fatalities, and supports the sustainability goals of the city. Despite the fact that communities of color will benefit the most from active transportation infrastructure development, historical disenfranchisement in tandem with a lack of diverse representation within public participation contributes to an inequitable distribution of walking and biking investments throughout the city of San Francisco. While research shows that Black …

Influence Of Altitude And Scan Angle On Uas-Lidar Ground Height Measurement Accuracy In Juncus Roemerianus Scheele (Black Needle Rush)-Dominated Marshes, Michael Amelunke

Master's Theses

Coastal marshes are influenced by complex interactions among environmental and human factors. Marsh plant communities exist across subtle elevation gradients which are highly influenced by the local tidal regime. To better understand these dynamic conditions, improved methodologies for acquiring accurate elevation values are a necessity in marsh research and management. However, overestimation of marsh elevation values obtained from remote sensing is common due to vegetation characteristics. The goal of this study was to address this problem by determining the optimum altitude and scan angle for Light Detection and Ranging (LiDAR) collection using an Unmanned Aerial System (UAS) within Juncus roemerianus …