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Results for “Geographic Information Systems (GIS)”

Search indexed NASA NTRS and DOE OSTI research on propulsion, heat transfer, battery materials and energy systems. Follow report and document links to the original sources.

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At least 19 records
All sourcesNASA NTRSDOE OSTI
NASA NTRS1989

Integrating NASA's Land Analysis System (LAS) image processing software with an appropriate Geographic Information System (GIS): A review of candidates in the public domain

A user requirements analysis (URA) was undertaken to determine and appropriate public domain Geographic Information System (GIS) software package for potential integration with NASA's LAS (Land Analysis System) 5.0 image processing system. The necessity for a public domain system was underscored due to the perceived need for source code access and flexibility in tailoring the GIS system to the needs of a heterogenous group of end-users, and to specific constraints imposed by LAS and its user interface, Transportable Applications Executive (TAE). Subsequently, a review was conducted of a variety of public domain GIS candidates, including GRASS 3.0, MOSS, IEMIS, and two university-based packages, IDRISI and KBGIS. The review method was a modified version of the GIS evaluation process, development by the Federal Interagency Coordinating Committee on Digital Cartography. One IEMIS-derivative product, the ALBE (AirLand Battlefield Environment) GIS, emerged as the most promising candidate for integration with LAS. IEMIS (Integrated Emergency Management Information System) was developed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). ALBE GIS is currently under development at the Pacific Northwest Laboratory under contract with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers' Engineering Topographic Laboratory (ETL). Accordingly, recommendations are offered with respect to a potential LAS/ALBE GIS linkage and with respect to further system enhancements, including coordination with the development of the Spatial Analysis and Modeling System (SAMS) GIS in Goddard's IDM (Intelligent Data Management) developments in Goddard's National Space Science Data Center.

Rochon, Gilbert L.↗
NASA NTRS1992

Water quality modeling using geographic information system (GIS) data

Protection of the environment and natural resources at the Kennedy Space Center (KSC) is of great concern. The potential for surface and ground water quality problems resulting from non-point sources of pollution was examined using models. Since spatial variation of parameters required was important, geographic information systems (GIS) and their data were used. The potential for groundwater contamination was examined using the SEEPAGE (System for Early Evaluation of the Pollution Potential of Agricultural Groundwater Environments) model. A watershed near the VAB was selected to examine potential for surface water pollution and erosion using the AGNPS (Agricultural Non-Point Source Pollution) model.

Engel, Bernard A↗
NASA NTRS1994

Automation technology using Geographic Information System (GIS)

Airport Surface Movement Area is but one of the actions taken to increase the capacity and safety of existing airport facilities. The System Integration Branch (SIB) has designed an integrated system consisting of an electronic moving display in the cockpit, and includes display of taxi routes which will warn controllers and pilots of the position of other traffic and warning information automatically. Although, this system has in test simulation proven to be accurate and helpful; the initial process of obtaining an airport layout of the taxi-routes and designing each of them is a very tedious and time-consuming process. Other methods of preparing the display maps are being researched. One such method is the use of the Geographical Information System (GIS). GIS is an integrated system of computer hardware and software linking topographical, demographic and other resource data that is being referenced. The software can support many areas of work with virtually unlimited information compatibility due to the system's open architecture. GIS will allow us to work faster with increased efficiency and accuracy while providing decision making capabilities. GIS is currently being used at the Langley Research Center with other applications and has been validated as an accurate system for that task. GIS usage for our task will involve digitizing aerial photographs of the topology for each taxi-runway and identifying each position according to its specific spatial coordinates. The information currently being used can be integrated with the GIS system, due to its ability to provide a wide variety of user interfaces. Much more research and data analysis will be needed before this technique will be used, however we are hopeful this will lead to better usage of man-power and technological capabilities for the future.

Brooks, Cynthia L.↗
NASA NTRS1982

Energy Facility Siting by Means of Environmental Modelling with LANDSAT, Thematic Mapper and Geographic Information System (GIS) Data

Currently based on ground and aerial surveys, the land cover data base of the Pennsylvania Power and Light Company is routinely used for modelling the effects of alternative generating plant and transmission line sites on the local and regional environment. The development of a satellite-based geographic information system would facilitate both the preparation of environmental impact statements by power companies and assessment of the data by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. A cooperative project is planned to demonstrate the methodology for integrating satellite data into an existing geographic information system, d to further evaluate the ability of satellite data in modeling environmental conditions that would be applied in the preparation and assessment of environmental impact statements.

Source record↗
NASA NTRS2011

Analysis of Association Between Remotely Sensed (RS) Data and Soil Transmitted Helminthes Infection Using Geographical Information Systems (GIS): Boaco, Nicaragua

Soil-transmitted helminths are intestinal nematodes that can infect all members of a population but specially school-age children living in poverty. Infection can be significantly reversed with anthelmintic drug treatments and sanitation improvement. Implementation of effective public health programs requires reliable and updated information to identify areas at higher risk and to calculate amount of drug required. Geo-referenced in situ prevalence data will be overlaid over an ecological map derived from RS data using ARC Map 9.3 (ESRI). Prevalence data and RS data matching at the same geographical location will be analyzed for correlation and those variables from RS data that better correlate with prevalence will be included in a multivariate regression model. Temperature, vegetation, and distance to bodies of water will be inferred using data from Moderate-Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) and Landsat TM and ETM+. Elevation will be estimated with data from The Shuttle Radar Topography Mission (SRTM). Prevalence and intensity of infections are determined by parasitological survey (Kato Katz) of children enrolled in rural schools in Boaco, Nicaragua, in the communities of El Roblar, Cumaica Norte, Malacatoya 1, and Malacatoya 2). This study will demonstrate the importance of an integrated GIS/RS approach to define sampling clusters without the need for any ground-based survey. Such information is invaluable to identify areas of high risk and to geographically target control programs that maximize cost-effectiveness and sanitation efforts.

MorenoMadrinan, Max J.↗
NASA NTRS2015

Enhancing the NASA Prediction of Worldwide Energy Resource Web Data Delivery System with Geographic Information System (GIS) Capabilities

Renewable energy technologies are changing the face of the world's energy market. Currently, these technologies are being incorporated within existing structures to increase energy efficiency. Crucial to the success of the emerging renewable market is the availability of accurate, global solar radiation, and meteorology data. This poster traces the history of the development of an effort to distribute data parameters from NASA's research for use in the energy sector applications spanning from renewable energy to energy efficiency. These data may be useful to several renewable energy sectors: solar and wind power generation, agricultural crop modeling, and sustainable buildings.

Chandler, William S.↗
NASA NTRS1997

Managing Data in a GIS Environment

A Geographic Information System (GIS) is a computer-based system that enables capture, modeling, manipulation, retrieval, analysis and presentation of geographically referenced data. A GIS operates in a dynamic environment of spatial and temporal information. This information is held in a database like any other information system, but performance is more of an issue for a geographic database than a traditional database due to the nature of the data. What distinguishes a GIS from other information systems is the spatial and temporal dimensions of the data and the volume of data (several gigabytes). Most traditional information systems are usually based around tables and textual reports, whereas GIS requires the use of cartographic forms and other visualization techniques. Much of the data can be represented using computer graphics, but a GIS is not a graphics database. A graphical system is concerned with the manipulation and presentation of graphical objects whereas a GIS handles geographic objects that have not only spatial dimensions but non-visual, i e., attribute and components. Furthermore, the nature of the data on which a GIS operates makes the traditional relational database approach inadequate for retrieving data and answering queries that reference spatial data. The purpose of this paper is to describe the efficiency issues behind storage and retrieval of data within a GIS database. Section 2 gives a general background on GIS, and describes the issues involved in custom vs. commercial and hybrid vs. integrated geographic information systems. Section 3 describes the efficiency issues concerning the management of data within a GIS environment. The paper ends with a summary of the main concerns of this paper.

Beltran, Maria↗
NASA NTRS2004

Geographic Information Systems and Web Page Development

The Facilities Engineering and Architectural Branch is responsible for the design and maintenance of buildings, laboratories, and civil structures. In order to improve efficiency and quality, the FEAB has dedicated itself to establishing a data infrastructure based on Geographic Information Systems, GIS. The value of GIS was explained in an article dating back to 1980 entitled "Need for a Multipurpose Cadastre" which stated, "There is a critical need for a better land-information system in the United States to improve land-conveyance procedures, furnish a basis for equitable taxation, and provide much-needed information for resource management and environmental planning." Scientists and engineers both point to GIS as the solution. What is GIS? According to most text books, Geographic Information Systems is a class of software that stores, manages, and analyzes mapable features on, above, or below the surface of the earth. GIS software is basically database management software to the management of spatial data and information. Simply put, Geographic Information Systems manage, analyze, chart, graph, and map spatial information. GIS can be broken down into two main categories, urban GIS and natural resource GIS. Further still, natural resource GIS can be broken down into six sub-categories, agriculture, forestry, wildlife, catchment management, archaeology, and geology/mining. Agriculture GIS has several applications, such as agricultural capability analysis, land conservation, market analysis, or whole farming planning. Forestry GIs can be used for timber assessment and management, harvest scheduling and planning, environmental impact assessment, and pest management. GIS when used in wildlife applications enables the user to assess and manage habitats, identify and track endangered and rare species, and monitor impact assessment.

Reynolds, Justin↗
NASA NTRS1993

Studying Venus using a GIS database

A Geographic Information System (GIS) can significantly enhance geological studies on Venus because it facilitates concurrent analysis of many sources of data, as demonstrated by our work on topographic and deformation characteristics of tesserae. We are creating a database of structures referenced to real-world coordinates to encourage the archival of Venusian studies in digital format and to foster quantitative analysis of many combinations of data. Contributions to this database from all aspects of Venusian science are welcome.

Price, Maribeth↗
NASA NTRS2004

Geographic Information Systems and Web Page Development

The Facilities Engineering and Architectural Branch is responsible for the design and maintenance of buildings, laboratories, and civil structures. In order to improve efficiency and quality, the FEAB has dedicated itself to establishing a data infrastructure based on Geographic Information Systems, GIs. The value of GIS was explained in an article dating back to 1980 entitled "Need for a Multipurpose Cadastre which stated, "There is a critical need for a better land-information system in the United States to improve land-conveyance procedures, furnish a basis for equitable taxation, and provide much-needed information for resource management and environmental planning." Scientists and engineers both point to GIS as the solution. What is GIS? According to most text books, Geographic Information Systems is a class of software that stores, manages, and analyzes mapable features on, above, or below the surface of the earth. GIS software is basically database management software to the management of spatial data and information. Simply put, Geographic Information Systems manage, analyze, chart, graph, and map spatial information. At the outset, I was given goals and expectations from my branch and from my mentor with regards to the further implementation of GIs. Those goals are as follows: (1) Continue the development of GIS for the underground structures. (2) Extract and export annotated data from AutoCAD drawing files and construct a database (to serve as a prototype for future work). (3) Examine existing underground record drawings to determine existing and non-existing underground tanks. Once this data was collected and analyzed, I set out on the task of creating a user-friendly database that could be assessed by all members of the branch. It was important that the database be built using programs that most employees already possess, ruling out most AutoCAD-based viewers. Therefore, I set out to create an Access database that translated onto the web using Internet Explorer as the foundation. After some programming, it was possible to view AutoCAD files and other GIS-related applications on Internet Explorer, while providing the user with a variety of editing commands and setting options. I was also given the task of launching a divisional website using Macromedia Flash and other web- development programs.

Reynolds, Justin↗
NASA NTRS1997

Issues in Defining Software Architectures in a GIS Environment

The primary mission of the Pan-American Center for Earth and Environmental Studies (PACES) is to advance the research areas that are relevant to NASA's Mission to Planet Earth program. One of the activities at PACES is the establishment of a repository for geographical, geological and environmental information that covers various regions of Mexico and the southwest region of the U.S. and that is acquired from NASA and other sources through remote sensing, ground studies or paper-based maps. The center will be providing access of this information to other government entities in the U.S. and Mexico, and research groups from universities, national laboratories and industry. Geographical Information Systems(GIS) provide the means to manage, manipulate, analyze and display geographically referenced information that will be managed by PACES. Excellent off-the-shelf software exists for a complete GIS as well as software for storing and managing spatial databases, processing images, networking and viewing maps with layered information. This allows the user flexibility in combining systems to create a GIS or to mix these software packages with custom-built application programs. Software architectural languages provide the ability to specify the computational components and interactions among these components, an important topic in the domain of GIS because of the need to integrate numerous software packages. This paper discusses the characteristics that architectural languages address with respect to the issues relating to the data that must be communicated between software systems and components when systems interact. The paper presents a background on GIS in section 2. Section 3 gives an overview of software architecture and architectural languages. Section 4 suggests issues that may be of concern when defining the software architecture of a GIS. The last section discusses the future research effort and finishes with a summary.

Acosta, Jesus↗
NASA NTRS2000

A Remote Sensing/Geographic Information Systems Approach in the Selection of Mars Sites of Biological Interest

The search for extinct or extant life on Mars is the search for past or present liquid water, respectively. There are numerous signs of past liquid water on Mars in the form of dry river valleys, paleolakes, and their associated flow and sediment patterns. While some of these features are recent (Amazonian, 1.8 billion years ago to present), there is no evidence that any are currently flowing. Liquid water on the surface would only be possible at those sites with sufficiently high temperatures and pressure. The key to the selection of sites on Mars to search for evidence of life is the search for the presence of water. An approach to this problem is the use of remotely sensed data incorporated in a geographic information system (GIS). A GIS is a computer-based system capable of assembling, storing, manipulating, and displaying geographically referenced information, i.e., data identified according to their locations. In planetary studies these data are acquired from remote sensing (RS) platforms (orbiters). These data are co-registered layers and, through the use of GIS analysis functions, areas on these layers can be selected as a function of the information desired. Our work used existing data layers from the Viking and Mars Global Surveyor missions to determine where water could be possible in liquid form on the Martian surface, based on the phase diagram for water.

Lobitz, B. M.↗
NASA NTRS1994

GIS and RDBMS Used with Offline FAA Airspace Databases

A geographic information system (GIS) and relational database management system (RDBMS) were used in a Macintosh environment to access, manipulate, and display off-line FAA databases of airport and navigational aid locations, airways, and airspace boundaries. This proof-of-concept effort used data available from the Adaptation Controlled Environment System (ACES) and Digital Aeronautical Chart Supplement (DACS) databases to allow FAA cartographers and others to create computer-assisted charts and overlays as reference material for air traffic controllers. These products were created on an engineering model of the future GRASP (GRaphics Adaptation Support Position) workstation that will be used to make graphics and text products for the Advanced Automation System (AAS), which will upgrade and replace the current air traffic control system. Techniques developed during the prototyping effort have shown the viability of using databases to create graphical products without the need for an intervening data entry step.

air traffic control↗
NASA NTRS1984

Spatial information technologies for remote sensing today and tomorrow; Proceedings of the Ninth Pecora Symposium, Sioux Falls, SD, October 2-4, 1984

Topics discussed at the symposium include hardware, geographic information system (GIS) implementation, processing remotely sensed data, spatial data structures, and NASA programs in remote sensing information systems. Attention is also given GIS applications, advanced techniques, artificial intelligence, graphics, spatial navigation, and classification. Papers are included on the design of computer software for geographic image processing, concepts for a global resource information system, algorithm development for spatial operators, and an application of expert systems technology to remotely sensed image analysis.

Source record↗
NASA NTRS2005

A Collaborative Decision Environment for UAV Operations

NASA is developing Intelligent Mission Management (IMM) technology for science missions employing long endurance unmanned aerial vehicles (UAV's). The IMM groundbased component is the Collaborative Decision Environment (CDE), a ground system that provides the Mission/Science team with situational awareness, collaboration, and decisionmaking tools. The CDE is used for pre-flight planning, mission monitoring, and visualization of acquired data. It integrates external data products used for planning and executing a mission, such as weather, satellite data products, and topographic maps by leveraging established and emerging Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) standards to acquire external data products via the Internet, and an industry standard geographic information system (GIs) toolkit for visualization As a Science/Mission team may be geographically dispersed, the CDE is capable of providing access to remote users across wide area networks using Web Services technology. A prototype CDE is being developed for an instrument checkout flight on a manned aircraft in the fall of 2005, in preparation for a full deployment in support of the US Forest Service and NASA Ames Western States Fire Mission in 2006.

D'Ortenzio, Matthew V.↗
NASA NTRS1991

GIS modeling of archaeological site locations: A low-tech approach

A Geographic Information System (GIS)-type analysis of archaeological site locations using a dBase III plus program and a desk top computer is presented. A previously developed model of site locations in the Sequatchie Valley of northeastern Alabama is tested against known site locations in another large survey area there. The model fails to account for site locations in the test area. A model is developed for the test area and indicates the site locations are indeed different. Whether this is due to differences in site locations on a sub-regional level, or to sample error in the original model is unknown.

Futato, Eugene M.↗
NASA NTRS1990

Practical applications of remote sensing technology

Land managers increasingly are becoming dependent upon remote sensing and automated analysis techniques for information gathering and synthesis. Remote sensing and geographic information system (GIS) techniques provide quick and economical information gathering for large areas. The outputs of remote sensing classification and analysis are most effective when combined with a total natural resources data base within the capabilities of a computerized GIS. Some examples are presented of the successes, as well as the problems, in integrating remote sensing and geographic information systems. The need to exploit remotely sensed data and the potential that geographic information systems offer for managing and analyzing such data continues to grow. New microcomputers with vastly enlarged memory, multi-fold increases in operating speed and storage capacity that was previously available only on mainframe computers are a reality. Improved raster GIS software systems have been developed for these high performance microcomputers. Vector GIS systems previously reserved for mini and mainframe systems are available to operate on these enhanced microcomputers. One of the more exciting areas that is beginning to emerge is the integration of both raster and vector formats on a single computer screen. This technology will allow satellite imagery or digital aerial photography to be presented as a background to a vector display.

Whitmore, Roy A., Jr.↗