Physical Sciences and Mathematics Commons^™

A Cutting-Plane Method For Contiguity-Constrained Spatial Aggregation, Johannes Oehrlein, Jan-Henrik Haunert

Journal of Spatial Information Science

Aggregating areas into larger regions is a common problem in spatial planning, geographic information science, and cartography. The aim can be to group administrative areal units into electoral districts or sales territories, in which case the problem is known as districting. In other cases, area aggregation is seen as a generalization or visualization task, which aims to reveal spatial patterns in geographic data. Despite these different motivations, the heart of the problem is the same: given a planar partition, one wants to aggregate several elements of this partition to regions. These often must have or exceed a particular size, be …

Insight Provenance For Spatiotemporal Visual Analytics: Theory, Review, And Guidelines, Andreas Hall, Paula Ahonen-Rainio, Kirsi Virrantaus

Journal of Spatial Information Science

Research on provenance, which focuses on different ways to describe and record the history of changes and advances made throughout an analysis process, is an integral part of visual analytics. This paper focuses on providing the provenance of insight and rationale through visualizations while emphasizing, first, that this entails a profound understanding of human cognition and reasoning and that, second, the special nature of spatiotemporal data needs to be acknowledged in this process. A recently proposed human reasoning framework for spatiotemporal analysis, and four guidelines for the creation of visualizations that provide the provenance of insight and rationale published in …

Vgi In Surveying Engineering: Introducing Collaborative Cloud Land Surveying, Ioannis Sofos, Vassilios Vescoukis, Maria Tsakiri

Journal of Spatial Information Science

olunteered geographic information (VGI) has enabled many innovative applications in various scientific fields. This paper introduces a new framework called "collaborative cloud-based land surveying" (CCLS) that uses VGI principles for data sharing among surveyor engineers to boost the productivity and improve the quality of their applications. A cloud-based spatio-temporal data repository is presented, aiming to facilitate the sharing of VGI among surveyor engineers. A fully-functional distributed software application has been developed and used to apply CCLS in a large-scale land surveying project run by the Greek Ministry of Culture, which involves the mapping of the historic center of Athens. Results …

Sailing: Cognition, Action, Communication, Thora Tenbrink, Frank Dylla

Journal of Spatial Information Science

How do humans perceive and think about space, and how can this be represented adequately? For everyday activities such as locating objects or places, route planning, and the like, many insights have been gained over the past few decades, feeding into theories of spatial cognition and frameworks for spatial information science. In this paper, we explore sailing as a more specialized domain that has not yet been considered in this way, but has a lot to offer precisely because of its peculiarities. Sailing involves ways of thinking about space that are not normally required (or even acquired) in everyday life. …

Editorial, Matt Duckham

Journal of Spatial Information Science

No abstract provided.

Fundamentals Of Satellite Remote Sensing: An Environmental Approach 2e, Luke Wallace

Journal of Spatial Information Science

Book review of Fundamentals of Satellite Remote Sensing: An Environmental Approach 2e" by Emilio Chuvieco"

Quantifying Space, Understanding Minds: A Visual Summary Approach, Mark Simpson, Kai-Florian Richter, Jan Oliver Wallgrün, Alexander Klippel

Journal of Spatial Information Science

This paper presents an illustrated, validated taxonomy of research that compares spatial measures to human behavior. Spatial measures quantify the spatial characteristics of environments, such as the centrality of intersections in a street network or the accessibility of a room in a building from all the other rooms. While spatial measures have been of interest to spatial sciences, they are also of importance in the behavioral sciences for use in modeling human behavior. A high correlation between values for spatial measures and specific behaviors can provide insights into an environment's legibility, and contribute to a deeper understanding of human spatial …

Modeling And Manipulating Spacetime Objects In A True 4d Model, Ken Arroyo Ohori, Hugo Ledoux, Jantien Stoter

Journal of Spatial Information Science

The concept of spacetime has long been used in physics to refer to models that integrate 3D space and time as a single 4D continuum. We argue in this paper that it is also advantageous to use this concept in a practical geographic context by realizing a true 4D model, where time is modeled and implemented as a dimension in the same manner as the three spatial dimensions. Within this paper we focus on 4D vector objects, which can be implemented using dimension-independent data structures such as generalized maps. A 4D vector model allows us to create and manipulate models …

Cognitively Plausible Representations For The Alignment Of Sketch And Geo-Referenced Maps, Sahib Jan, Angela Schwering, Carl Schultz, Malumbo Chaka Chipofya

Journal of Spatial Information Science

In many geo-spatial applications, freehand sketch maps are considered as an intuitive way to collect user-generated spatial information. The task of automatically mapping information from such hand-drawn sketch maps to geo-referenced maps is known as the alignment task. Researchers have proposed various qualitative representations to capture distorted and generalized spatial information in sketch maps, however thus far the effectiveness of these representations has not been evaluated in the context of an alignment task. This paper empirically evaluates a set of cognitively plausible representations for alignment using real sketch maps collected from two different study areas with the corresponding geo-referenced maps. …

Topological Augmentation: A Step Forward For Qualitative Partition Reasoning, Matthew P. Dube

Journal of Spatial Information Science

The current state of the art for partition based qualitative spatial reasoning systems such as the 9-intersection, 9+-intersection, direction relation matrix, and peripheral direction relations is that of the binary set intersection — either empty or non-empty — conveying the intersection (or lack thereof) of an object in the sets deriving the partition. While such representations are sufficient for topological components of objects, these representations are not sufficient for various tasks in qualitative spatial reasoning (composition, representation transfer, converse, etc.) regarding partitions as tiles. Topological augmentation expands the current binary status quo into a system of assigning topological relations between …

Getting Girls In Stem & The Dangers Of Forgetting That Science Is Art - Someone Made It Up, Heidi Therese Dangelmaier, Camilla Hermann

The STEAM Journal

Encouraging girls to participate in STEM is a hot topic that has captured the concern of the world’s academic, business and scientific communities. The intention is noble, however the strategies being deployed are reinforcing the very bias society seeks to eliminate. If we wish to advance our evolutionary journey as a species, a shift from “feeling sorry for disadvantaged girls” to “fearing STEM without girls’ reformation” is imperative. This piece discusses the rise to an initiative to redesign culture: Girlapproved.

The Future Of Nuclear Security In Moroccan Territory After The Creation Of The New Moroccan Agency Of Nuclear And Radiological Safety And Security: Opportunities And Challenges, Amal Touarsi, Amina Kharchaf

International Journal of Nuclear Security

Nowadays, a security regime for protecting nuclear and radiological material—providing an intelligent national regulatory institution and establishing national security laws—is necessary in order for a state to ensure security of nuclear and radiological materials used within its borders.

This paper focuses on discussing the opportunities and challenges facing the future of nuclear security after the creation of the new Moroccan Agency of Nuclear and Radiological Safety and Security.

The Future Of Nuclear Security: A Medical Physicist’S Perspective, Katharine E. Thomson

International Journal of Nuclear Security

Planning for the future of nuclear security is a vital and complex task, requiring cooperation and contribution from many disciplines and industries. This diversity of expertise should include the medical sector, which faces many of the same challenges as the nuclear industry: controlling access to dangerous material, creating a strong security culture, cooperating with the wider world and engaging the public.

Medical physicists, of which the author is one, oversee all aspects of small-scale radiation use. This paper discusses three key areas increasingly important to both medical and nuclear uses of radioactive materials: public engagement, prevention of nuclear and radiological …

Assessing And Enhancing Nuclear Safety And Security Culture For Small Facilities That Handle Radioactive Material, Solymosi Máté

International Journal of Nuclear Security

The use of radioactive sources is expanding all over the world and abreast the necessity of the enhancement of its safe and secure application is increasing too. In the nuclear industry, the safety and security are top priorities since decades. They share the same goal, to protect humans from the negative affect of the ionizing radiation. The human component of them is a significant factor and technical solutions can protect us so far and thus the culture for safety and security become a major focus. On the other hand, there are still some contradiction between recommendations and international guidance of …

Assessing Preservation Priorities Of Caves And Karst Areas Using The Frequency Of Endemic Cave-Dwelling Species, Eugen Nitzu, Marius Vlaicu, Andrei Giurginca, Ioana N. Meleg, Ionut Popa, Augustin Nae, Ştefan Baba

International Journal of Speleology

Endemic and rare species as bioindicators of habitat vulnerability were used to develop protection and management plans for biotope prioritization (mainly islands habitats, lava tubes or groundwaters). Due to their narrow distribution, the endemic species (species confined to a restricted geographic area) are more susceptible to ecological disequilibrium and habitat loss than the widespread ones. Consequently, endemics become endangered in the context of ecological disturbance caused by anthropogenic pressure, making them suitable candidates to assess environmental preservation needs. Taking into consideration that most of the stygobitic and troglobitic species are endemic and confined to specific karst areas, based on their …

Analysis Of Gender Differences In Authentic Science Inquiry Practices, Arianna Garcia

Ursidae: The Undergraduate Research Journal at the University of Northern Colorado

The purpose of this project is to study differences in male versus female science epistemology as reflected in their practices during authentic science inquiry. Understanding an individual’s science epistemology is important to develop better methods of teaching authentic science inquiry. Science epistemology refers to the beliefs people have about the process of performing scientific inquiry and how scientific information is generated. In particular, students may believe science is a simple process with definite conclusions previously established by professionals, or that science is a complex field with many unanswered questions which require creative and unconventional processes to expose. Scientific inquiry in …

Note From The Editorial Board

Dartmouth Undergraduate Journal of Science

No abstract provided.

Movement I From Lamentationes, Timothy W. Mcdunn

CrissCross

This piece is a setting of the first poem in the book of ʼêḵāh from the Hebrew Bible (the book of Lamentations in the Christian Old Testament). Setting the text in its original language has had two primary advantages: (1) it preserved euphony and other poetic subtleties and (2) it left the poetry's original cultural context intact.

I use harmonic rhetoric to imitate several features of the text. One of them is the so-called "tragic reversal," a device illustrated by the lines cited above, where a reversal of fortune is expressed through the contrast between the first colon and the …

Digital Forensic Readiness In Organizations: Issues And Challenges, Nickson Menza Karie, Simon Maina Karume Dr.

Journal of Digital Forensics, Security and Law

With the evolution in digital technologies, organizations have been forced to change the way they plan, develop, and enact their information technology strategies. This is because modern digital technologies do not only present new opportunities to business organizations but also a different set of issues and challenges that need to be resolved. With the rising threats of cybercrimes, for example, which have been accelerated by the emergence of new digital technologies, many organizations as well as law enforcement agencies globally are now erecting proactive measures as a way to increase their ability to respond to security incidents as well as …

Minerva 2017, The Honors College

Minerva

This issue of Minerva includes a feature on Honors College research collaboratives; an article on Honors students studying abroad in Singapore and Chile; an article reflecting upon the 15-year anniversary of the Honors College and the importance of mentorship; and articles on Honors students Isaiah Mansour and Aliya Uteova.

Unit Root Test For Panel Data Ar(1) Time Series Model With Linear Time Trend And Augmentation Term: A Bayesian Approach, Jitendra Kumar, Anoop Chaturvedi, Umme Afifa, Shafat Yousuf, Saurabh Kumar

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

The univariate time series models, in the case of unit root hypothesis, are more biased towards the acceptance of the Unit Root Hypothesis especially in a short time span. However, the panel data time series model is more appropriate in such situation. The Bayesian analysis of unit root testing for a panel data time series model is considered. An autoregressive panel data AR(1) model with linear time trend and augmentation term has been considered and derived the posterior odds ratio for testing the presence of unit root hypothesis under appropriate prior assumptions. A simulation study and real data analysis are …

'Parallel Universe' Or 'Proven Future'? The Language Of Dependent Means T-Test Interpretations, Anthony M. Gould, Jean-Etienne Joullié

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Of the three kinds of two-mean comparisons which judge a test statistic against a critical value taken from a Student t-distribution, one – the repeated measures or dependent-means application – is distinctive because it is meant to assess the value of a parameter which is not part of the natural order. This absence forces a choice between two interpretations of a significant test result and the meaning of the test hypothesis. The parallel universe view advances a conditional, backward-looking conclusion. The more practical proven future interpretation is a non-conditional proposition about what will happen if an intervention is (now) applied …

Robust Measures Of Variable Importance For Multivariate Group Designs, Tolulope T. Sajobi, Lisa M. Lix

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Variable importance measures based on discriminant analysis and multivariate analysis of variance are useful for identifying variables that discriminate between two groups in multivariate group designs. Variable importance measures are developed based on trimmed and Winsorized estimators for describing group differences in multivariate non-normal populations.

Modeling Agreement Between Binary Classifications Of Multiple Raters In R And Sas, Aya A. Mitani, Kerrie P. Nelson

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Cancer screening and diagnostic tests often are classified using a binary outcome such as diseased or not diseased. Recently large-scale studies have been conducted to assess agreement between many raters. Measures of agreement using the class of generalized linear mixed models were implemented efficiently in four recently introduced R and SAS packages in large-scale agreement studies incorporating binary classifications. Simulation studies were conducted to compare the performance across the packages and apply the agreement methods to two cancer studies.

Inferential Procedures For Log Logistic Distribution With Doubly Interval Censored Data, Yue Fang Loh, Jayanthi Arasan, Habshah Midi, M. R. Abu Bakar

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

The log logistic model with doubly interval censored data is examined. Three methods of constructing confidence interval estimates for the parameter of the model were compared and discussed. The results of the coverage probability study indicated that the Wald outperformed the likelihood ratio and jackknife inferential procedures.

Approximating The Distribution Of Indefinite Quadratic Forms In Normal Variables By Maximum Entropy Density Estimation, Ghasem Rekabdar, Rahim Chinipardaz

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

The quadratic form of non-central normal variables is presented based on a sum of weighted independent non-central chi-square variables. This presentation provides moments of quadratic form. The maximum entropy method is used to estimate the density function because distribution moments of quadratic forms are known. A Euclidean distance is proposed to select an appropriate maximum entropy density function. In order to compare with other methods some numerical examples were evaluated. Also, for discrimination between two groups by the Euclidean distances, we obtained a stochastic representation for the linear discriminant function using the quadratic form. The maximum entropy estimation was an …

Missing Data In Longitudinal Surveys: A Comparison Of Performance Of Modern Techniques, Paola Zaninotto, Amanda Sacker

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Using a simulation study, the performance of complete case analysis, full information maximum likelihood, multivariate normal imputation, multiple imputation by chained equations and two-fold fully conditional specification to handle missing data were compared in longitudinal surveys with continuous and binary outcomes, missing covariates, and an interaction term.

Semi-Parametric Method To Estimate The Time-To-Failure Distribution And Its Percentiles For Simple Linear Degradation Model, Laila Naji Ba Dakhn, Mohammed Al-Haj Ebrahem, Omar Eidous

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Most reliability studies obtained reliability information by using degradation measurements over time, which contains useful data about the product reliability. Parametric methods like the maximum likelihood (ML) estimator and the ordinary least square (OLS) estimator are used widely to estimate the time-to-failure distribution and its percentiles. In this article, we estimate the time-to-failure distribution and its percentiles by using a semi-parametric estimator that assumes the parametric function to have a half- normal distribution or an exponential distribution. The performance of the semi-parametric estimator is compared via simulation study with the ML and OLS estimators by using the mean square error …

On Variance Balanced Designs, Dilip Kumar Ghosh, Sangeeta Ahuja

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

Balanced incomplete block designs are not always possible to construct because of their parametric relations. In such a situation another balanced design, the variance balanced design, is required. This construction of binary, equal replicated variance balanced designs are discussed using the half fraction of the 2n factorial designs with smaller block sizes. This method was also extended to construct another variance balanced design by deleting the last block of the resulting variance balanced designs. Its efficiency factor compared with randomized block designs was compared and found to be highly efficient.

Jmasm 48: The Pearson Product-Moment Correlation Coefficient And Adjustment Indices: The Fisher Approximate Unbiased Estimator And The Olkin-Pratt Adjustment (Spss), David A. Walker

Journal of Modern Applied Statistical Methods

This syntax program is intended to provide an application, not readily available, for users in SPSS who are interested in the Pearson product–moment correlation coefficient (r) and r biased adjustment indices such as the Fisher Approximate Unbiased estimator and the Olkin and Pratt adjustment.