[TriLUG] Fw: Open source GIS seminar: lunch June 21

Mon Jun 20 11:05:55 EDT 2005

Hi Folks,
      I apologize for the short notice, but Markus Neteler, Project
Coordinator for the GRASS GIS project  ( http://grass.itc.it/ ) is in town
this week and is giving a presentation at Jordan Hall tomorrow at 12:00
noon.  For the deer -vehicle collision prediction model, they used an
openMosix cluster to reduce the processing time for the model from 100 days
to 5 days.  ( I saw the presentation at the Open Source Geospatial
conference last week.)

Doug

Doug Newcomb
USFWS
Raleigh, NC
919-856-4520 ext. 14 doug_newcomb at fws.gov
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             Helena Mitasova                                               
             <hmitaso at unity.nc                                             
             su.edu>                                                    To 
                                       gis-announce at lists.ncsu.edu         
             06/12/2005 11:10                                           cc 
             PM                        Doug_Newcomb at fws.gov                
                                                                   Subject 
                                       Open source GIS seminar: lunch June 
                                       21                                  

I would like to invite you to our special lunch seminar next week on
Tuesday June 21
when we will host Markus Neteler, the coordinator of the development
of one of the largest geospatial open source projects - GRASS GIS.
We plan for a short, hands-on seminar after the talk - I will email more
info about it later this week.

The talk should be of general interest (beyond open source GIS) -
see the abstract below for more details about the WWII imagery
application and deer vehicle collisions risk maps,

Helena

============================================================

Special seminar: Tuesday June 21 at 12.00 noon, 1132 Jordan hall

The Open Source Geographical Information System GRASS:
Development and Applications

Markus Neteler,
Center for Scientific and Technological Research, Trento, Italy

GRASS (the Geographic Resources Analysis Support System,
http://grass.itc.it) is a free software/open source GIS that includes
modules for raster and vector data analysis, multispectral image
processing, visualization and geospatial modeling. The new features
of GRASS6 will be described, such as a new topological 2D/3D vector
engine, network analysis, SQL-based attribute management and integration
with GDAL/OGR libraries supporting an extensive range of formats
including OGC-conformal Simple Features. The talk will illustrate
the combination of GRASS GIS, databases, image processing and machine
learning using two applications recently developed at ITC-irst:

- risk mapping for unexploded bombs of World War II
- predictive risk model for deer-vehicle collisions.

More than 1 million bombs were air-dropped by the Allied Forces during
the Second World War in Italy, and at least 10% did not explode. After
more than 50 years, these ordnances are still operative: unexploded
bombs (UXB) constitute a risk for population in case of accidental
discovery.  The existence of unclassified and very accurate material
from the war archives (NARA) has opened a new perspective. A software
system was developed which creates and distributes, on a regional
scale, accurate maps of the risk due to aerial bombing. High
throughput machine learning classifiers were combined for automated
crater detection with a complex archive of bombing mission data and
reconnaissance imagery.  The system provides a complete geoinformatic
solution for mapping the risk of unexploded bombs in the Adige Valley
for the Autonomous Province of Trento, Italy.

As a second application, a predictive risk model for deer-vehicle
collisions has been developed.  The model uses a variety of input
features derived from GIS, such as distance from urban areas and from
water, wildlife population density maps, vector line analysis (road
curvatures) and traffic data.  Features for the model include a
multiscale accident site characterization based on the integrated use
of orthophoto landuse classification and morphometrical analysis of
the digital elevation model.  The methodology has been applied at
mesoscale for the predictive modeling of deer-vehicle collisions.
 From a system of multiple classifiers a resulting deer-vehicle
accident risk map is currently applied for risk mitigation in
Trentino.

Speaker info
Markus Neteler currently works as a researcher at the Center for
Scientific and Technological Research (ITC-irst) Trento, Italy (since
2001) and at Centro di Ecologia Alpina (CEA) (since 2005). His main
research interests are remote sensing for environmental risk
assessment and Free Software GIS development. He has been coordinating
the GRASS GIS development since 1998. He is co-author of a book on the
Open Source Geographical Information System GRASS and several papers
on environmental applications in GIS. Markus received his MSc degree
in Physical Geography and Landscape Ecology from the University of
Hannover in Germany in 1999 where he worked at the Institute of
Geography as Research Scientist and teaching associate until 2001. In
2003 he co-founded GDF Hannover, Germany, with focus on Free Software
GIS products, providing services such as formal FOSS training, spatial
data analysis and remote sensing applications.

Helena Mitasova
Dept. of Marine, Earth and Atm. Sciences
1125 Jordan Hall, NCSU Box 8208,
Raleigh NC 27695
http://skagit.meas.ncsu.edu/~helena/