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GISN & STEM Professionals' Blog

The GISN and STEM Professional's Blog is an online collaborative effort where scientists associated with GLOBE post their thoughts, comments, and philosophies about a variety of science topics.

GLOBE strongly encourages positive and productive discussions to further advance the scientific understanding of all involved with the GLOBE Program.
 


 

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Our project for SEES 2024 was "Creating a Model to Identify High-Risk Areas for Flash Flooding in Houston, Texas." In this blog, I will discuss how we calculated which areas are "high-risk." There are many ways to identify the most at-risk points of flooding in a given region. Such points are commonly identified in a flood map, such as the one here: For our project, we decided to look at elevation data, which is perhaps the most intuitive: water flows downhill and will accumulate in the lowest regions. To get our elevation data, we used ...


Posted in: GLOBE Science Topics: CLIMATE CHANGE EARTH AS A SYSTEM EARTH SYSTEM SCIENCE   Investigation Areas: EARTH AS A SYSTEM BIOSPHERE LAND COVER CLASSIFICATION   Primary Audience: SCIENTISTS STUDENTS TEACHERS   Student Research Reports: MISSION MOSQUITO REPORT


SEES 2024 Experience Getting the opportunity to participate in the NASA SEES Earth System Explorers program has positively impacted my educational and career journey in more ways than I could've imagined. Throughout this internship, I gained an immense amount of knowledge in Earth science, utilizing the GLOBE Observer app, ArcGIS, Collect Earth Online, Python, and many other tools to better understand the environment around us. During the last few weeks of the program, a team of seven other interns and I completed our own research project called "Harnessing ...


Posted in: GLOBE Science Topics: EARTH AS A SYSTEM   Investigation Areas: EARTH AS A SYSTEM LAND COVER CLASSIFICATION MOSQUITOES   Primary Audience: SCIENTISTS STUDENTS TEACHERS   Student Research Reports: MISSION MOSQUITO REPORT


In this blog post, I will go through every step of the internship and outline my experience! Before I do that, first of all, I would like to say that I am so happy that I got to spend my summer with SEES! This program was so amazing and helped guide me a bit more on what I want to do in my future career and in college! I am very grateful for all of our mentors who guided us through the program and provided great knowledge and support to all of us! Thank you for this opportunity. Modules: Climate Science Background and Exploring the Earth To prepare for the ...


Posted in: GLOBE Science Topics: EARTH AS A SYSTEM   Investigation Areas: EARTH AS A SYSTEM LAND COVER CLASSIFICATION MOSQUITOES   Student Research Reports: MISSION MOSQUITO REPORT


The wildfire data analysis journey began with a dataset comprising over 1200 points located in the California region. To uncover the correlation between land cover types and wildfire risk, we first needed to determine the wildfire risk for each point using the FEMA Wildfire Risk Map. This step involved entering coordinates into the software to obtain the wildfire risk index for each location. From this dataset, we categorized approximately 325 points as having a very low risk, 350 as moderate risk, and 578 as very high risk for wildfires. These categories served as the ...


Posted in: GLOBE Science Topics: EARTH AS A SYSTEM   Investigation Areas: EARTH AS A SYSTEM LAND COVER CLASSIFICATION   Primary Audience: SCIENTISTS STUDENTS TEACHERS   Student Research Reports: MISSION MOSQUITO REPORT


Roboflow is an open-source dataset management platform, where users can import data, label it, and then have a model train on it. For my group's project, CS-FLARE, we used Roboflow to label brush, grass, trees, and leaf litter in our NESW Images as shown below.  When I initially began labeling images, I tried using bounding boxes for each picture like the leaf litter in the image above. This became a bit annoying as sometimes the bounding boxes would cut parts of objects like trees, but it was still faster than using the polygon tool to manually trace around objects. ...


Posted in: Investigation Areas: EARTH AS A SYSTEM LAND COVER CLASSIFICATION MOSQUITOES   Primary Audience: STUDENTS TEACHERS   Student Research Reports: MISSION MOSQUITO REPORT


Adopt-a-Pixel | Where does water meet land in my community? Scanning the Area As our first assignment as part of the Earth System Explorers team, we've been tasked with making our first observations using the GLOBE Observer App. The goal was to make 12 total observations (6 Potential Mosquito Habitat & 6 Land Cover).  To be more efficient, I decided to make all of my observations at 6 different still bodies of water. This way I could do a MHM and a LC observation at each location. Before I began, I scouted potential bodies of water on Global Surface Water ...


Posted in: Investigation Areas: EARTH AS A SYSTEM LAND COVER CLASSIFICATION MOSQUITOES   Primary Audience: STUDENTS TEACHERS TRAINERS


I built my mosquito traps on June 20th and ran the experiment until July 15th. I collected a total of 15 observations during this period. To construct the traps I used three identical pots to hold water. The goal of my experiment was to find which type of mosquito bait would be the most effective at attracting and sheltering mosquitos. For the three baits I used dried leaves, grass clippings, and a wooden plank. I chose these three baits because they represent possible real life environments that mosquitos may breed in. The dried leaves simulates a pool of water that does not evaporate ...


Posted in: Investigation Areas: HYDROSPHERE EARTH AS A SYSTEM LAND COVER CLASSIFICATION MOSQUITOES   Primary Audience: STUDENTS TEACHERS TRAINERS


My mosquito trap was definitely a rollercoaster, and with this being the last required update, I still plan on seeing how the traps do after the internship finishes since this has been really interesting. To give some background, I set out three traps around 30-40 yards away from each other around my AOI so I could get an idea of how different areas may yield different results. The first trap was in my backyard, the second trap was in a park close to my house, and the third was by a sidewalk (the pictures I use are from the third trap). The only trap I really had to refill with water was ...


Posted in: GLOBE Science Topics: EARTH AS A SYSTEM   Investigation Areas: LAND COVER CLASSIFICATION MOSQUITOES   Primary Audience: STUDENTS TEACHERS TRAINERS   Student Research Reports: INTERNATIONAL VIRTUAL SCIENCE SYMPOSIUM REPORT MISSION MOSQUITO REPORT


Mosquito Trap Week 1 For the mosquito traps, I decided quite early on that my independent variable would be the container. I got 3 different containers; an old tire, a black bucket, and a gallon bottle/container while keeping all other factors the same. I used the same bait and the same amount of water and placed all 3 traps in my backyard behind the shade of the t ​​​​​​​ree. I   decided on using a timeframe of about 5 days to take my samples.  ​​​​ ​​     Week 1: Five days had passed, and it was time to sample the traps. Unfortunately, when I got ...


Posted in: Investigation Areas: BIOSPHERE LAND COVER CLASSIFICATION MOSQUITOES   Primary Audience: STUDENTS TEACHERS TRAINERS   Student Research Reports: INTERNATIONAL VIRTUAL SCIENCE SYMPOSIUM REPORT MISSION MOSQUITO REPORT


AOI Fieldwork At first, collecting land cover data for 37 points within my area of interest felt like a daunting task. However, after only a few "expeditions" in the past week, I was able to complete all 37 observations. To make my work easier and more accurate, I intentionally choose an AOI that would contain as many points as possible within a nearby park. This was to ensure that I could access as many points as possible. Despite my best efforts, many of the points still landed in residential properties. This activity actually reminded me how many neighborhoods there are in my ...


Posted in: Investigation Areas: HYDROSPHERE EARTH AS A SYSTEM LAND COVER CLASSIFICATION MOSQUITOES   Primary Audience: STUDENTS TEACHERS TRAINERS   Student Research Reports: INTERNATIONAL VIRTUAL SCIENCE SYMPOSIUM REPORT MISSION MOSQUITO REPORT


In October, our SEES research team presented at the 2022 MIT Undergraduate Research Technology Conference (MIT URTC), becoming the first SEES team ever to be selected to present a paper at this competition. We wanted to share our experience with MIT URTC, from the starting point of our SEES research project to developing a publishable manuscript and presenting our paper at the conference. At the onset of our research, we were motivated by a story we read in the news that detailed how human populations worldwide were becoming increasingly susceptible to vector-borne diseases, with ...


Posted in: GLOBE Science Topics: EARTH AS A SYSTEM EARTH SYSTEM SCIENCE   Investigation Areas: EARTH AS A SYSTEM LAND COVER CLASSIFICATION MOSQUITOES   News Topics: NEWS BRIEFS   Primary Audience: PARTNERS SCIENTISTS STUDENTS TEACHERS   Student Research Reports: INTERNATIONAL VIRTUAL SCIENCE SYMPOSIUM REPORT MISSION MOSQUITO REPORT


Background Remote working and remote learning presented challenges to us all. As a Master Trainer in Colombia, Juan Felipe Restrepo Mesa faced and overcame his share of challenges when working with a new group of educators from rural areas.  Most of the training material and the tests that need to be answered were in English. This, of course, means that citizen scientists who do not speak English were prevented from making their contributions living in those areas where GLOBE Observer Mosquito Habitat Mapper's contributions are essential. Juan Felipe had to set up a MEET ...


Posted in: GLOBE Science Topics: EARTH AS A SYSTEM EARTH SYSTEM SCIENCE   Investigation Areas: HYDROSPHERE LAND COVER CLASSIFICATION MOSQUITOES   Primary Audience: COUNTRY COORDINATORS PARTNERS SCIENTISTS TEACHERS TRAINERS