ANR Statewide Program on GIS

Mission Statement: IGIS aims to support high-priority programs to advance research and extension projects that enhance agricultural productivity, natural resource conservation and healthy communities into the future by providing Informatics and Geospatial Information Systems tools and applications.

ANR Recently announced the development of a new Statewide Program called the Informatics and GIS (IGIS) program. The new program aims to over the next five years become the nexus for ANR’s rich and diverse geospatial and ecological data, research information, and resources for academics and the public who rely on geospatial and informatics data, analysis and display.  Through data capture, information sharing, and collaboration, we aim to increase our ability to make meaningful predictions of the agricultural, ecosystem, and community response to future change, to increase our understanding of California’s diverse natural, agricultural and human resources, and to support research and outreach projects that enhance agricultural productivity, natural resource conservation and healthy communities into the future.

The IGIS team needs your input to design this resource to be an efficient and helpful delivery of information and GIS support. If you are affiliated with ANR, please take a few minutes to complete the Survey of Informatics and GIS Needs, Knowledge and Data Availability.  This is a short and comprehensive survey that will assess GIS, data and information needs, evaluate your level of informatics and GIS expertise and use of geospatial tools and data.  Your response will be of great assistance toward building a successful State-wide program.

Update from LDCM

Some updates from this video from NASA:

• Imagery should be available late May 2013
• Landsat 7 has enough fuel to last until 2016
• LCDM has a 5 year mission, but they are hopeful for a 10 year mission
• Data continuity is the key to this whole deal: "continuity drives landsat"
• High resolution data does not have the temporal resolution as Landsat - via Kass G.

Very excited.

LDCM FAQ here.

Landsat 8 is up and orbiting!

Atlas 5 Rocket With Landsat PayloadFun day today watching the LDCM (Landsat Data Continuity Mission) make its successful launch of the newest and coolest sensor in the Landsat family. The flawless launch from Vandenburg AFB was witnessed with lots of cheering and earth-themed cupcakes in Mulford Hall!

While I am not actively using Landsat imagery, I used Landsat 4 and 5 imagery for my dissertation, back in the day, and use it still to introduce geographic concepts in class. And I am super excited to see the new imagery. The sensor has similar spectral bands to the ETM+ sensor on Landsat 7, but also I think includes a new coastal aerosol band (443 nm) and cirrus detection band (1375 nm). The legacy of the Landsat program is tremendous; the program has given us reliable, comprehensive, and detailed views of a dynamic earth for decades. It is a government sponsored science program with lasting impact.

Some nice write-ups about Landsat:

NASA Earth Observatory Landsat Looks and Sees
NASA Landsat: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/landsat/main/index.html
USGS Landsat Missions: http://landsat.usgs.gov/
Landsat Top 10: http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/landsat/news/landsat-40th-top10.html

Anyway, it was nice to have everyone on board to witness the launch! Thanks GIF folks and everyone else in the lab. Now we just have to watch out for DA14 on Friday!

New Landsat Satellite set to launch Feb 11th

NASA's Landsat Data Continuity Mission (LDCM) is scheduled to launch Feb. 11 from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. A joint NASA and U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) mission, LDCM will add to the longest continuous data record of Earth's surface as viewed from space.

LDCM is the eighth satellite in the Landsat series, which began in 1972. The mission will extend more than 40 years of global land observations that are critical in many areas, such as energy and water management, forest monitoring, human and environmental health, urban planning, disaster recovery and agriculture. NASA and the USGS jointly manage the Landsat Program. Check out more info.

On the eve on GIS Day, the word of 2012: GIF!

Today the Huffington Post announced that the Word of the Year in 2012, according to the Oxford American Dictionaries, is GIF. Alas, they aren't talking about our GIF, fantastic resource for all things geospatial on the Berkeley campus, provider of innovative web mapping projects, source of useful training, meeting place for like-minded spatial aware professionals, and host of tomorrow's GIS Day, but about the humble Graphics Interchange Format, "relic of the 80s" and slave to internet kitties everywhere, which turned 25 this year. Still, this semantic confusion is likely to drive up our search results! Go GIF!

New ANR Statewide Program on GIS announced

We are pleased to announce the development of a new statewide program called the ANR Informatics and Geographic Information Systems Statewide Program (IGIS). IGIS will organize, digitize and make Web-accessible some of California’s longest continuous data pertaining to agriculture and natural ecosystems, including weather and productivity related to management inputs — concrete data for modeling responses to change across the state.

IGIS will be supported and directed by a leadership team including Maggi Kelly (director), Lisa Fischer, Karl Krist and Joni Rippee, with key staff Shane Feirer, Kris Lynn-Patterson and Todd Perez. The responsibilities of the leadership team are to maintain IGIS direction, explore collaborations and maintain connection between ANR and UC campuses.  The team will work with an advisory board that will assist the leadership team on all components of IGIS from data standardization and acquisition to data access and specific project selection and feedback from potential users.

Our vision is that over the next five years IGIS will provide a home for ANR’s rich and diverse collection of data, information and resources for academics and members of the public who rely on geospatial and informatics data, analysis and display.

In service of the ANR continuum, University of California researchers, academics from other institutions and the public, IGIS will provide the ability to connect with rich and diverse ANR resources, datasets and information through an online web accessible portal. IGIS will assist in applied research and extension activities that rely on geospatial data, analysis and display. IGIS will offer networking and collaboration and, when possible, provide training and research support on important agricultural and natural resource issues.

Specifically, IGIS will become the umbrella for ANR-wide GIS and informatics activities in order to

Provide coordination for research and extension activities that require GIS and/or geospatial analysis
Provide acquisition, storage and dissemination of large data sets from ANR Research and Extension Centers for researchers, managers and the public via Web-access (REC RAC, REC Web, Cal-EON)
Create a virtual GIS and Informatics service center to provide for project level work that has Division-wide application (GIS Service Center)
For more information, please see our developing website http://ucanr.edu/sites/IGIS.

Barbara Allen-Diaz
Vice President, Agriculture and Natural Resources

New green blog about our web participation paper

Check it out! our recent paper on the SNAMP website is featured in the green blog.

Land Change Science Position Open!

We are very excited to have open a new Cooperative Extension specialist position in Land Change Science. The successful Land Change CE specialist will have a PhD, and will develop a vibrant applied research program, primarily based in California. There are no formal teaching duties with this position, instead, the incumbant will have outreach and extension duties.

We are searching for someone who can help us understand, predict and plan for the complexities of land use change in California. This might be someone from geography, landscape ecology, sociology, or economics, for example, and might focus on planning, modeling or observations of land change, biophysical feedbacks from land change, or spatial analysis. But they must be an adept and capable communicator who can speak to diverse audiences, from landowners, to politicians, to farmers, to scientists, to planners, to citizens.

The Specialist would provide science-based solutions and bridge conflicting interests with knowledge, targeted research, and local education regarding the relationships between expanding population and climate change, and the remaining matrix of wild landscapes, urban areas, working landscapes and agriculture.

The Specialist would provide resources for county-based Cooperative Extension personnel, including learning from UCCE personnel about the needs of decision makers at the local level, and acting as a information and training resource for the use of new tools (GIS, remote sensing, smart phone applications, etc.) for land use analysis.

Please consider applying if this fits you! I will be happy to answer questions.

Pre-development Delta report from SFEI

The San Francisco Estuary Institute-Aquatic Science Center is pleased to announce the publication of its latest report, Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta Historical Ecology Investigation: Exploring Pattern and Process. The report is the culmination of several years of research synthesizing thousands of pieces of historical evidence with contemporary scientific understanding. The report provides new information about how the Delta functioned to provide habitat for native species and includes dozens of rarely seen historical accounts, maps, and photographs. For more information, please see today's press release.

The report and Geographic Information System (GIS) data are available for download here. Printed copies of the report will be available in several weeks, at a cost of $75 each (plus tax/shipping).

Media Contacts:
Robin Grossinger, Senior Scientist, San Francisco Estuary Institute-Aquatic Science Center, (510) 746-7380 (office), 510 326 3732 (cell), or robin@sfei.org

Carl Wilcox, Policy Advisor to the Director for the Bay-Delta, California Department of Fish and Game, (707) 738-4134, or cwilcox@dfg.ca.gov

Philadelphia food desert eradication project

Here is a recent article from the Washington Post examining Philadelphia's Get Healthy Philly initiative. $900,000 from the project is going to be spent on turning 632 corner stores in the city into green grocers. The effort helps these corner stores buy and supply fresh fruits and vegetables and buy the infrastructure needed to store them, such as refrigerators.

This effort goes in hand with a new study in the city that will examine what happens when more nutritious foods are introduced into traditionally underserved neighborhoods. Measuring what people bought before, what they’re eating now, and how health outcomes change. The article also explores other research on food deserts, access to healthy foods, and health outcomes with lessons learned.

For the full article click here.