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Description
Spatial Signals is a podcast about remote sensing, GIS, and geospatial technologies - but more importantly it’s a podcast about the people who use and apply them. This podcast is sponsored by AmericaView, the national remote sensing network dedicated to empowering Earth Observation. Your hosts are Dr. Bradley Shellito from Youngstown State University and Mr. Chris McGinty, the Executive Director of AmericaView. New episodes every Monday morning.
38 Episodes
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Pablo Viramontes from the New Mexico Department of Agriculture joins us to talk about his time as an ROTC cadet, GIS in the intelligence field, an internship with the Bureau of Land Management in New Mexico, gathering data at the Organ Mountains-Desert Peaks National Monument, geospatial work with the TRIO Upward Bound program, K-12 geography education, visiting the White House, the National Space Council, the El Paso Science Festival, the Valencia Soil and Water Conservation District, agriculture applications, and much more. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Paige Brochu from University of Vermont joins us to talk about the influence of Jurassic Park, archeology in the Caribbean, mapping Lake Champlain shipwrecks, Benedict Arnold’s gunboat, the Spatial Analysis Lab (SAL) at UVM, interning with the Nature Conservancy in Rhode Island, a spatial connection via Strava that ended up in a Postdoc position, planetary health, meeting with policy makers on Capitol Hill, VermontView and Jarlath O’Neill-Dunne, drone imagery and the resources of the SAL used for disaster response in Vermont, GIS and remote sensing for addressing public health issues, spatial analysis related to drinking water, analysis of greenspace and green infrastructure, training the next generation of geospatial experts, and much more. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Tyler Erickson from VorGeo joins us to talk about foldable paper maps, working with remotely sensed data at a technology non-profit, the founding of MichiganView, open Landsat data, Google Earth Engine, Tyler’s time working at Google on the Earth Engine project, the founding of VorGeo and the work being done there, CTrees and above-ground biomass measurement, OpenET and water data, SAR data, SatCamp, advanced machine learning techniques, foundation models and embeddings, geospatial applications of large language modules, and much more. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Nancy French from the Michigan Tech Research Institute at Michigan Technological University joins us to talk about the Environmental Research Institute of Michigan (ERIM), SAR applications, field data in conjunction with radar remote sensing to analyze fire effects, the Bettles fire in Alaska, MichiganView, wildfires and remote sensing, wildfire smoke and health, estimating fuel consumption, fuel moisture monitoring, and much more. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
JB Sharma from the University of North Georgia joins us to talk about JB’s transition from a physics background to geospatial technologies, grassroots STEM literacy, how to get students interested in remote sensing, JB’s work with AmericaView, AI-based techniques for handling the volume of remote sensing data, deep learning, GEOBIA for classifying UAS data, learning communities in online learning, ASPRS, and much more. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Joseph Kerski from Joseph Kerski LLC, University of Denver and Auburn University joins us to talk about growing up in a motel in western Colorado, making maps as a kid that included address ranges, working at USGS, being part of the Esri Education team, Joseph’s passion for teaching geography, spatial thinking concepts, multidisciplinary teaching, mathematics and spatial thinking, teaching with geospatial and developing a general public course, new education projects, and much, much more. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Lisa Wirth, the Program Director of AmericaView, joins us to talk about Lisa's graduate work in Fisheries in Alaska, tagging fall chum salmon on the Yukon River, having field instruments freeze up, tracking fish with radiotelemetry, thermal remote sensing of rivers, using SAR imagery in Alaska, using a FLIR camera on a Cessna, the Alaska Geobotanical Center, AlaskaView, Augmented Reality sandboxes, managing all of the StateViews of AmericaView, and much more. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
This is Round Two of our special “Squared Circle” episodes, where a group of guests gets together to wrestle with a particular topic. For this episode, we're joined by Dr. Donna Delparte from the University of Idaho, Dr. Bruce Millett from South Dakota State University, and Dr. Lance Yarbrough from the University of Mississippi, and we're discussing all things drones. We talk about the state of the union of drones today, the impact of the National Defense Authorization Act (the NDAA) and the American Security Drone Act on drones, sensors, and data collection, the Blue List and the Green List for UAS and sensors, the future of drones in research and education, and much more. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Geoff Bland, Andy Henry, Lisa Ogiemwonyi, and Sallie Smith from the NASA AREN (Aerokats and Rover Education Network) team join us to talk about the beginnings of the AREN project, Aerokats and remote sensing via kites, flying the first educational UAS with sensors on the Channel Islands of California, RSESTeP, ICARUS, incorporating remote sensing into K-12 classrooms, place-based education, the development of Aeropods, the various camera systems and sensors that can be used on Aeropods, high resolution imagery from kites, looking at change over time in imagery, collecting air quality data, teacher training in the AREN workshops, local community projects, operations and teamwork, and much more. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Robbyn Abbitt from Miami University joins us to talk about working at an underground storage tank unit in Indiana, planning to work outside in Idaho but being assigned to an indoor GIS lab, the concept of lumping and splitting, getting hired as the GIS Coordinator for Miami University, the Ohio GIS Conference, Robbyn’s work with the original Gap Analysis Program and NHD, the Blue Line Program, the OGRIP Council, using drones in the classroom, digital twins, and much more. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Happy Earth Observation Day, everyone! Our guests for this special Earth Science Week episode are Rebecca Dodge of Midwestern State University and Tom Mueller from the Massachusetts Bureau of Geographic Information (MassGIS), the founding parents of Earth Observation Day which is celebrated this week. We delve into how Earth Observation Day came about, how it's grown, materials that have been developed over the years, and what’s happening around the country with it. We also touch on current EOD activities such as the NASA Aerokats, Mapathons, Landsat imagery, data collection with your phone, and much more. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Forrest Bowlick from University of Massachusetts-Amherst joins us to talk about finding Svalbard on a globe at two years old, National Geographic Bees, a life-changing locked door, the McNair Scholars Program, taking Introduction to GIS three different times, the scholarship of teaching and learning, Forrest giving a TED talk on GIS, the development of MassachusettsView, the Geographer’s Craft, strategies for teaching GIS and incorporating new developments, teaching projections in a GIS course, a Roger Tomlinson documentary, the Impossible Map from 1947, and much more. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Joe Ortiz from Kent State University joins us to talk about using micro-fossils to learn about how climate changes over time, the Beaver-SCAT instrumentation, spending two months at sea in the North Atlantic, remote sensing and collecting sediment cores at sea, research at the Bering Strait, spending 3 days stuck in the ice, strategies for avoiding polar bears, identifying algae from space, harmful algal blooms, machine learning techniques, the benefits of open-source software for remote sensing and analysis, and multispectral UAS imagery analysis. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Greg Bonynge from the University of Rhode Island joins us to talk about working on a Alpaca farm in Pennsylvania, an internship with the USDA forest service, modeling the spread of the southern pine beetle, spatial statistics, working at a neuroscience lab, being a beta-tester for ModelBuilder, land cover change in Tanzania, SSEER (Scientific Support for Environmental Emergency Response), ingesting GIS data and documenting metadata, GIS data archiving, ArcGIS Indoors, indoor scanning with lidar for creating 3D building models, and hurricane response and modeling potential flood and wind impacts. Show notes and photos are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Carter Wang from Towson University joins us to talk about his introduction to Google Earth in high school in China, urban heat islands in Arizona, MarylandView, the AmericaView Journal of Earth Observation and Geospatial Applications, the annual Geospatial Technology Summer Camp at Towson University, urban forestry analysis, land cover change related to tree loss, NAIP imagery, and the AAG remote sensing specialty group. Show notes are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Scott Powell from Montana State University joins us to talk about Scott’s work at the Guadalupe Mountains National Park in Texas, mapping cave openings in the Carlsbad Caverns area, Scott’s time as a firefighter fighting wildfires, Landsat imagery time series printouts, the Oregon Cascades. geologic carbon sequestration, using aerial hyperspectral sensors for detecting leaking carbon emissions, drone applications and imagery acquisition, CART decision trees, MontanaView, and much more. Show notes are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Larry Biehl from Purdue University joins us to talk about a prophetic high school paper about computer applications in farming, the Laboratory for Applications of Remote Sensing (LARS), Skylab, the development of MultiSpec, the vision to keep MultiSpec free and available, the Terrestrial Observatory, the birth of IndianaView, Useful 2 Usable, remote sensing agricultural applications, spectrometers and radiometers, and the importance of data calibration. Show notes are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Tom Mueller from the Massachusetts Bureau of Geographic Information (MassGIS) joins us to talk about Pchem ending Tom’s time as a Chemistry major, building an atlas of nursing homes, the importance of service learning for students, the GeoTech Center, Humanitarian OpenStreetMap, Mapathons, mapping and analysis of water samples and contamination, MassGIS, the Massachusetts Spatial Data Infrastructure, the birth of MassachusettsView, the Cohasset Center for Coastal Student Research and much more. Show notes are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Lance Yarbrough from the University of Mississippi joins us to talk about an encounter with a Floyd Sabins textbook at a university book sale at a young age, examining geology through stereopairs, the Year of the Satellite, remote sensing application in North Dakota. lidar data analysis, 3D models and Structure from Motion, GeoAI tools, the appeal of retro analog maps and tools, giving expert witness testimony in court, and much more. Show notes are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
Kyle Fredrick from PennWest University - California joins us to talk about teaching a middle-school class in college, groundwater modeling, user-friendly vs. user-surly software, his fantastic geologic mapping summer field class that he teaches each year, remote sensing of Utah landscapes, the growth of the sand spit and new habitats at Presque Isle in Erie, and the potential for critical and rare-earth mineral extraction from coal waste piles. Show notes are available at: https://americaview.substack.com
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