Collecting and analyzing data about the Earth, its inhabitants, and the ecological processes that tie them all together has been at the forefront of our desire to understand the world around us for many centuries. Natural history museums collect specimens, geographers collect aerial and satellite imagery, and sensor networks collect field measurements — all producing volumes of data that are bound by space, place, and time. But we still have so much more to learn. Drawing correlations between these data sources is key to understanding the complexity of our natural world and projecting how it may change in the future. UC Berkeley’s Geospatial Innovation Facility and its partners are developing web applications to help scientists, decision makers, and the general public understand environmental and social issues relating to climate change and biodiversity. I will talk about our Cal-Adapt and Berkeley Ecoinformatics Engine projects as primary examples.
Understanding the Natural World Through Spatial Data
Kevin Koy, Executive Director of the Geospatial Innovation Facility, has over fourteen years of experience working with geospatial technology. Kevin leads research projects and applications, develops and teaches technical workshops, provides organizational support to the facility, and promotes geospatial solutions throughout the Bay Area community. Prior to joining the GIF, Kevin was the remote sensing and GIS specialist for the American Museum of Natural History's Center for Biodiversity and Conservation. His experience at AMNH included mapping land cover change and developing capacity building initiatives in Vietnam and Lao PDR. Kevin's experience in geospatial technology began as a remote sensing and GIS analyst for the Smithsonian Institution's Conservation Biology Institute where he mapped Eld's deer habitat in Myanmar's dry dipterocarp forests.