Geography Commons^™

Open Access Data In Polar And Cryospheric Remote Sensing, Allen Pope, W. Rees, Adrian Fox, Andrew Fleming

Dartmouth Scholarship

This paper aims to introduce the main types and sources of remotely sensed data that are freely available and have cryospheric applications. We describe aerial and satellite photography, satellite-borne visible, near-infrared and thermal infrared sensors, synthetic aperture radar, passive microwave imagers and active microwave scatterometers. We consider the availability and practical utility of archival data, dating back in some cases to the 1920s for aerial photography and the 1960s for satellite imagery, the data that are being collected today and the prospects for future data collection; in all cases, with a focus on data that are openly accessible. Derived data …

Land Classification And Change Intensity Analysis In A Coastal Watershed Of Southeast China, Pei Zhou, Jinliang Huang, Robert Gilmore Pontius, Huasheng Hong

Geography

The aim of this study is to improve the understanding of land changes in the Jiulong River watershed, a coastal watershed of Southeast China. We developed a stratified classification methodology for land mapping, which combines linear stretching, an Iterative Self-Organizing Data Analysis (ISODATA) clustering algorithm, and spatial reclassification. The stratified classification for 2002 generated less overall error than an unstratified classification. The stratified classifications were then used to examine temporal differences at 1986, 1996, 2002, 2007 and 2010. Intensity Analysis was applied to analyze land changes at three levels: time interval, category, and transition. Results showed that land use transformation …

Changing Water Availability During The African Maize-Growing Season, 1979-2010, Lyndon Estes, Nathaniel W. Chaney, Julio Herrera-Estrada, Justin Sheffield, Kelly K. Caylor, Eric F. Wood

Geography

Understanding how global change is impacting African agriculture requires a full physical accounting of water supply and demand, but accurate, gridded data on key drivers (e.g., humidity) are generally unavailable. We used a new bias-corrected meteorological dataset to analyze changes in precipitation (supply), potential evapotranspiration (Ep, demand), and water availability (expressed as the ratio P/Ep) in 20 countries (focusing on their maize-growing regions and seasons), between 1979 and 2010, and the factors driving changes in Ep. Maizegrowing areas in Southern Africa, particularly South Africa, benefitted from increased water availability due in large part to demand declines driven primarily by declining …

Track Ii As A Method To Break Barriers: Pakistan-India Relations Since 1980, Talat A. Wizarat

Business Review

Track-II diplomacy made major contribution in reducing tension between the US and Soviet Union during late 1950’s and 1960’s. Attempts have been made in the past to apply the concepts developed particularly during 1960’s to other regions of the world. South Asia at one time had more than a hundred channels, only a few have survived. Some of these ventures have been one time exercise while others have survived for several years. Socialization process has been more successful than the other three stages. Filtration and transmission also hold great significance but several factors have retarded their growth. Implementation can only …

Somewhere There’S A Place For Us: Linking Fedora Digital Collections And Open Geoportal, Eleta Exline, Thelma Thompson, Michael Routhier, Place Project Group

PLACE Project

The University of New Hampshire Library and its partner, the UNH Earth Systems Research Center, have been awarded a grant in the amount of $474,156 from the Institute for Museum and Library Services, National Leadership Grants for Libraries Program, to build PLACE, the Position-based Location Archive Coordinate Explorer. Among project objectives is to provide a toolkit for other institutions to implement in their geospatial digital collections. The project will contribute to two open source communities: Open Geoportal (OGP) and Fedora Commons. In this poster session we will provide an overview of the PLACE project timeline and a visual representation of …

Potential Of X-Band Images From High-Resolution Satellite Sar Sensors To Assess Growth And Yield In Paddy Rice, Yoshio Inoue, Eiji Sakaiya, Cuizhen Wang

Faculty Publications

The comprehensive relationship of backscattering coefficient (σ⁰) values from two current X-band SAR sensors (COSMO-SkyMed and TerraSAR-X) with canopy biophysical variables were investigated using the SAR images acquired at VV polarization and shallow incidence angles. The difference and consistency of the two sensors were also examined. The chrono-sequential change of σ⁰ in rice paddies during the transplanting season revealed that σ⁰ reached the value of nearby water surfaces a day before transplanting, and increased significantly just after transplanting event (3 dB). Despite a clear systematic shift (6.6 dB) between the two sensors, the differences in σ …

The Once And Future World: Nature As It Was, As It Is, As It Could Be By J.B. Mackinnon, Pamela Banting

The Goose

Review of The Once and Future World: Nature As It Was, As It Is, As It Could Be by J.B. MacKinnon.

Everything, Now By Jessica Moore And Birds, Metals, Stones & Rain By Russell Thornton, Kelly Dean Shepherd

The Goose

Review of Everything, Now by Jessica Moore and Birds, Metals, Stones & Rain by Russell Thornton.

Living Through The End Of Nature: The Future Of American Environmentalism By Paul Wapner, Taylor Kraayenbrink

The Goose

Review of Living Through The End of Nature: The Future of American Environmentalism by Paul Wapner.

Parks, Peace And Partnership: Global Initiatives In Transboundary Conservation Edited By Michael S. Quinn, Len Broberg, And Wayne Freimund, Fenn Stewart

The Goose

Review of Parks, Peace and Partnership: Global Initiatives in Transboundary Conservation edited by Michael S. Quinn, Len Broberg, and Wayne Freimund.

Humanesis By David Cecchetto, Max Ritts

The Goose

Review of Humanesis by David Cecchetto.

Stories In A New Skin: Approaches To Inuit Literature By Keavy Martin, Allison K. Athens

The Goose

Review of Stories in a New Skin: Approaches to Inuit Literature by Keavy Martin.

X: Poems & Anti-Poems By Shane Rhodes, Tom Miller

The Goose

A review of Shane Rhodes' X: Poems & Anti-Poems. This review focuses on the link between language and landscape, and considers the ways in which that link, reflected in Rhodes' work, comments upon the use of language as an oppressive tool in the treatment of Native Americans and Canadians.

Spatial Relationships, Movements, And Habitat Associations Of Introduced “Non-Native” Elk Populations On Etolin And Zarembo Islands, Alaska, Jean S. Davidson

Geography and the Environment: Graduate Student Capstones

Etolin and Roosevelt Elk were introduced to Afognak Island, Alaska in 1929 (State of Alaska, 2013). Due to the success of that introduction, Roosevelt Elk and Rocky Mountain Elk were subsequently introduced to Zarembo and Etolin Islands in Southeast Alaska in 1987. Due to the environment of Southeast Alaska, the ability to determine movements, trends, and habitat preferences are limited. In support of the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G), this project analyzes the habitat preferences of the elk based upon data from global positioning systems. Locational data is analyzed for proximity to managed lands and considers proximity to …

Human Diversity In Jordan: Polymorphic Alu Insertions In General Jordanian And Bedouin Groups, Daniela Zanetti, May Sadiq, Robert Carreras-Torres, Omar Khabour, Almuthanna Alkaraki, Esther Esteban, Marc Via, Pedro Moral

Human Biology Open Access Pre-Prints

Jordan, located in the Levant region, is a crucial area to investigate human migration between Africa and Eurasia. Even thought, the genetic history of Jordanians is far to be clarified including the origin of the Bedouins today resident in Jordan. Here, we provide new genetic data on autosomal independent markers in two Jordanian population samples (Bedouins and general population) in order to approach the genetic diversity inside this country and to give new information about the genetic position of these populations in the frame of the Mediterranean and Middle East area. The analyzed markers are 18 Alu polymorphic insertions characterized …

Human Paternal Lineages, Languages And Environment In The Caucasus, David Tarkhnishvili, Alexander Gavashelishvili, Marine Murtskhvaladze, Mariam Gabelaia, Gigi Tevzadze

Human Biology Open Access Pre-Prints

Publications that describe the human Y-DNA haplogroup composition in different ethnic or linguistic groups and geographic regions provide no explicit explanation of the distribution of human paternal lineages in relation to specific ecological conditions. Our research attempts to address this topic for the Caucasus – a geographic region that encompasses a relatively small area but harbors high linguistic, ethnic, and Y-DNA haplogroup diversity. 224 men that identified themselves as ethnic Georgian were genotyped for Y-chromosome 23 STR markers and assigned to their geographic places of origin. The genotyped data were supplemented with the published data on the haplogroup composition and …

Toward A Biocommunicable Cartography Of Health Decision-Making In The Amazon Basin Of Ecuador, James Cartwright

Lawrence University Honors Projects

This paper comprises a critical, ethnographic study of health communication in a rural community of Amazonian Ecuador. By synthesizing approaches from anthropology, discourse studies, and public health, the study explores how conversations influence health decisions, how communities understand health systems, and how macrostructural discourse changes the political economy of healthcare in Ecuador. My work draws on the recent theoretical development of ‘biocommunicability’ in anthropology as well as earlier sociological research on knowledge construction. Most importantly, this paper offers a critique of current interventions by NGOs in the region.

Phylogeography Of E1b1b1b-M81 Haplogroup And Analysis Of Its Subclades In Morocco, Ahmed Reguig, Nourdin Harich, Abdelhamid Barakat, Hassan Rouba

Human Biology Open Access Pre-Prints

In this work, we have analyzed a total of 295 unrelated Berber-speaking men from the northern, center and southern of Morocco, in order to characterize frequency of E1b1b1b-M81 haplogroup and to refine the phylogeny of its subclades: E1b1b1b1-M107, E1b1b1b2-M183 and E1b1b1b2a-M165. For this purpose, we have typed four biallelic polymorphisms: M81, M107, M183 and M165. As results, a large majority of the Berber-speaking male lineages belong to the Y chromosomal E1b1b1b-M81 haplogroup. The frequency ranged from 79.1 to 98.5% in all localities sampled. Then, the E1b1b1b2-M183 was the most dominant subclade in our samples, which ranged from 65.1% to 83.1%. …

Mitochondrial Dna Variability Among Six South-American Amerindian Villages From The Pano Linguistic Group, Celso T. Mendes-Junior, Aguinaldo L. Simoes

Human Biology Open Access Pre-Prints

Although scattered throughout a large geographic area, the members of the Pano linguistic group present strong ethnic, linguistic and cultural homogeneity, a feature that causes them to be considered as components of a same “Pano” tribe. Nevertheless, the genetic homogeneity between Pano villages has not been examined before. To study the genetic structure of the Pano linguistic group, four major Native American mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) founder haplogroups were analyzed in 77 Amerindians from six villages of four Pano tribes (Katukina, Kaxináwa, Marúbo, and Yaminawa) located in the Brazilian Amazon. The central position of these tribes in the continent makes them …

Ala Schedule Place Poster Announcement, Place Project Group

PLACE Project

Page from the ALA Conference Schedule announcing the PLACE Poster Session.

How To Estimate Relative Spatial Resolution Of Different Maps Or Images Of The Same Area?, Christian Servin, A A. Velasco, Vladik Kreinovich

Departmental Technical Reports (CS)

In this paper, we describe how to estimate relative spatial resolution of different maps or images of the same area under uncertainty. We consider probabilistic and fuzzy approaches and we show that both approaches lead to the same estimates -- which makes us more confident that this joint result is reasonable.

The Impact Of Internet Gis On Access To Water Quality Information, Joseph H. Hoover

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Empowering citizens to comprehend complex environmental issues affecting their daily lives is essential to sustaining a healthy and informed public. The work of many environmental nongovernmental organizations (ENGOs) and institutions of higher education (IHEs) center around helping their stakeholders become informed of, and in turn, better understand complex environmental problems. However, providing individual stakeholders with knowledge about environmental issues that is easily accessible and understandable represents a recurring challenge in today's society. As a result, a gap continues to exist between that which is known about environmental problems and the public's awareness and understanding of those issues. Arsenic contamination of …

Interannual Variation In Biomass Burning And Fire Seasonality Derived From Geostationary Satellite Data Across The Contiguous United States From 1995 To 2011, Xiaoyang Zhang, Shobha Kondragunta, David Roy

GSCE Faculty Publications

Wildfires exhibit a strong seasonality that is driven by climatic factors and human activities. Although the fire seasonality is commonly determined using burned area and fire frequency, it could also be quantified using biomass consumption estimates that directly represent biomass loss (a combination of the area burned and the fuel loading). Therefore, in this study a data set of long-term biomass consumed was derived from geostationary satellite data to explore the interannual variation in the fire seasonality and the possible impacts of climate change and land management practices across the Contiguous United States (CONUS). Specifically, daily biomass consumed data were …

Changing Geographic Patterns Of High- And Low-Income Groups In Eight United States Metropolitan Areas, Taylor J. Hafley

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Income segregation produces unequal social outcomes and has steadily increased since the 1970s. High-poverty neighborhoods suffer from low performing schools, fewer jobs, an evaporation of local role models (Wilson 1987; Reardon and Bischoff 2011a). Recent evidence suggests growing income inequality influences the segregation of affluence more than the segregation of poverty (Reardon and Bischoff 2011b). Metropolitan areas that display strong population and economic growth are susceptible to higher levels of income inequality. I use three unique quantitative approaches to measure the segregation of affluence and poverty in a comparison of four metropolitan areas exhibiting strong growth to four metros with …

Predictive Modeling In The Search For Vertebrate Fossils: Geographic Object Based Image Analysis (Geobia) In The Eocene Of Wyoming, Bryan Bommersbach

Masters Theses

The development and testing of predictive models for identifying productive fossil localities represents a promising interdisciplinary endeavor among geographic information scientists, paleoanthropologists, and vertebrate paleontologists. This thesis analyzed high resolution (2m spatial resolution) commercial satellite imagery from the Worldview-2 satellite of five areas of the Great Divide Basin using a GEographic Object-Based Image Analysis (GEOBIA) technique, which segments the image into spectrally homogeneous, multi-pixel image objects. In addition to allowing statistical analysis of the spectral characteristics of the image objects, GEOBIA techniques also let analysts incorporate expert knowledge and contextual information to improve classification accuracy. The spectral characteristics of the …

Questioning The “Melting Pot”: Analysis Of Alu Inserts In Three Population Samples From Uruguay, Pedro C. Hidalgo, Patricia Mut, Elizabeth Ackermann, Gonzalo Figueiro, Monica Sans

Human Biology Open Access Pre-Prints

The way that immigrants integrate to recipient societies has been discussed for decades, mainly from the perspective of the social sciences. Uruguay, as other American countries, received different waves of European immigrants, although the details of the process of assimilation, when occurred, are unclear. In this paper, we use genetic markers to understand the process experienced by the Basques, one of the major migration waves that populated Uruguay, and its relation to other immigrants as well as to Native American and African descendants. For this purpose, we analyze the allele frequencies of ten ALU loci (A25, ACE, APOA1, B65, F13B, …

Delineating Firewise Communities/Usa® Developing Self-Mapping Techniques For Communities For Wildland Fire Behavior Modeling, Jennifer Muha

Geography and the Environment: Graduate Student Capstones

In an effort to collect boundaries of Firewise Communities/USA® participants in Colorado for academic and professional research, fire prevention efforts of homeowner’s insurance policy holders, and community-level risk planning, an instructional document for Google Maps Engine to self-define was developed. Ten ‘test communities’ were asked to participate, with a 60% response rate. From these responses, no initial problems or difficulties were noted. One boundary was used to model fire behavior in ArcMap, utilizing Spatial Analyst for fuel mitigation and the Wildland Fire Assessment Tool plugin to run behavior models with raster outputs. In conclusion, when Firewise communities worked in conjunction …

Owning Our Food System: Urban Community Gardening And Local Food Movements, Paige A. Edwards

Masters Theses

Food is a means of examining culture, including identity, autonomy and power. It creates relationships and memories between people via shared connections. Through food, I explore local food movements and urban community gardening.

We both ingest and produce garden-grown foods. This movement is often described as simple nostalgia. I suggest that it is a response against heavily processed foods within a system reliant on mass produced food. This desire for ownership pushes community gardens and other counter-hegemonic spaces forward in their goals of using social practice to challenge the established food industry and take control within their own lives.

Water In The 21st Century, Grayson Michael Shor

Social Sciences

The aim of this research project is to provide a comprehensive and global analysis of water use in order to provide the reader with a comprehensive grasp of current and impending issues. The included five (5) chapters discuss water distribution, conservation, purification, law, international development, economic debates, ethical consideration, as well as educated estimations of the effects water related issues may cause in the next one-hundred years.

Latino Rhythms In Downtown Los Angeles: A Case Study Of The Social, Physical, And Economic Environment Of "La Broadway", Ulises Antonio Gonzalez

Master's Theses

In an attempt to practice inclusive planning, this research project explores whether Broadway Avenue functions as an ethnic commercial strip and identifies social, physical, and economic components that contribute to the Latino neighborhood/ barrio. Using pilot studies Loukaitou-Sideris (2000), Loukaitou-Sideris (2002), Rojas (1993), Manzumdar et al. (2000), Main (2007), and Fernando (2007) as a foundation, this research uses a single case study in addition to several research methods: 42 random surveys, literature review and analysis, site observations/pictures, and land use survey.

Various scholars write that barrios have unique physical, social, economic, and political attributes. A new aesthetic, art, symbols, …