Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons™
Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®
- Keyword
-
- Birth Outcomes (1)
- Circuitscape (1)
- Critical GIS (1)
- Dams (1)
- Food Systems (1)
-
- GIS (1)
- Giant otter (1)
- Gold mining (1)
- Hydropower (1)
- Indigenous communities. (1)
- Land Cover Classifcation (1)
- Land change modeler (1)
- Madre de Dios (1)
- Massachusetts (1)
- Maxent (1)
- Mixed Methods (1)
- Political ecology (1)
- Political economy (1)
- Racial Capitalism (1)
- Random Forest (1)
- Renewable energy (1)
- Sentinel-1 (1)
- Sentinel-2 (1)
- Spatio-Temporal (1)
- Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) (1)
- White Supremacy (1)
- Worcester (1)
Articles 1 - 5 of 5
Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences
Food Deserts Debunked And Decentered: From Deficit To Relational Mapping For Food Justice In Worcester, Ma, Brenna Robeson
Food Deserts Debunked And Decentered: From Deficit To Relational Mapping For Food Justice In Worcester, Ma, Brenna Robeson
International Development, Community and Environment (IDCE)
The mapping of food deserts has become a standardized component of food and health policy work concerned with expanding food access. These maps often follow a similar format of spatially identifying where grocery stores are absent in communities, thus suggesting a straightforward problem diagnosis and intervention blueprint. This paper questions the over-emphasis among many food and health policy practitioners on these technically engineered policy stories, specifically for their obstruction of histories of white supremacy and capitalism within the US food system and urban landscapes. A mixed-methods approach is applied to a case study of Worcester, MA which appropriates GIS to …
Analyzing Trends And Patterns In Adverse Birth Outcomes In Massachusetts From 2000-2014, Madeleine Haynes
Analyzing Trends And Patterns In Adverse Birth Outcomes In Massachusetts From 2000-2014, Madeleine Haynes
International Development, Community and Environment (IDCE)
This study explores spatio-temporal trends and patterns in adverse birth outcomes (ABO) in the state of Massachusetts from 2000-2014. ABO include low birth weight (< 2500 g) and preterm deliveries (gestational age < 37 weeks). This research evaluates if there are areas in Massachusetts that have experienced statistically significant increases or decreases in ABO throughout the study period. Birth data was obtained from the Massachusetts Department of Public Health and only singleton, live births were included for the analysis. The data were aggregated to census tracts, and the total number of births and the number of ABOs were calculated for each census tract for each year. In total, 1478 census tracts were included in this analysis. Births to non-Hispanic black mothers and births to non-Hispanic white mothers were separated to evaluate if trends in ABO are similar regardless of race as previous literature has identified a much higher rate of ABO in births to non-Hispanic black women. Trends and patterns of ABO were evaluated using the Space Time Cube and the Mann-Kendall statistic and a multivariate regression was conducted to identify potential correlations between socioeconomic factors and prevalence of ABO. Results of this study can be used to identify areas that are experiencing an increase in ABO to potentially allow for more effective, targeted intervention methods.
Assessing The Impacts Of Gold Mining Deforestation On The Giant Otter (Pteronura Brasiliensis) In Madre De Dios, Peru, Erica Carcelen
Assessing The Impacts Of Gold Mining Deforestation On The Giant Otter (Pteronura Brasiliensis) In Madre De Dios, Peru, Erica Carcelen
International Development, Community and Environment (IDCE)
Gold mining activity is highly prevalent in the Madre de Dios region, Peru. This activity poses large environmental impacts including deforestation, sedimentation of rivers, and pollution from mercury used during extraction. Mining activity is a major threat to the endangered giant otter as it destroys its preferred riverine habitat. Moreover, mercury used during gold extraction bio-accumulates in fish, which constitutes the entirety of their diet. In order to conserve the giant otter, it is necessary to identify conservation priority areas. In a reactive conservation planning approach, the objective of this work was to prioritize areas suitable as giant otter habitat …
An Evaluation Of Sentinel-1 And Sentinel-2 For Land Cover Classification, Aaron Meneghini
An Evaluation Of Sentinel-1 And Sentinel-2 For Land Cover Classification, Aaron Meneghini
International Development, Community and Environment (IDCE)
This study evaluates Sentinel-1 and Sentinel-2 remotely sensed images for tropical land cover classification. The dual polarized Sentinel-1 VV and VH backscatter images and four 10-meter multispectral bands of Sentinel-2 were used to create six land cover classification images across two study areas along the border of the Bolivian Pando Department and the Brazilian state of Acre. Results indicate that Sentinel-2 multispectral bands possess a higher overall performance in delineating land cover types than the Sentinel-1 backscatter bands. Sentinel-1 backscatter bands delineated land cover types based on their surficial properties but did not facilitate the separation of similarly textured classes. …
Sacrifices For Development Or Thirst For Capital Accumulation? Case Study On The “El Diquís Hydroelectric Dam” In Costa Rica., Marco Mora
International Development, Community and Environment (IDCE)
Costa Rica’s state-led model of energy generation based on large-scale investments in hydropower has given the country autonomy in generating its own energy as well as sovereignty over its natural resources. Successive governments have used nationalist and ecological discourses to support the continued expansion of hydropower as the path to economic development. In more recent decades however, a number of factors have been eroding the dominance of the state-led hydropower development model. Some of those elements are the national and international pressures to liberalize and privatize the energy sector, an increasing body of scientific evidence indicating that large-scale hydropower in …