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Master of Arts / Department of Geography / John A. Harrington Jr / The objective of this thesis is classify climate for the Earth’s ocean areas. The classifica-tion task is accomplished in part by using monthly average sea surface temperature and precipita-tion data from 1980-2008. Coast-to-coast coverage of the needed data were obtained from the reanalysis product produced by the National Centers for Environmental Prediction and the National Center for Atmospheric Research. Köppen’s classification scheme was implemented in the ArcGIS suite of software, which was used to analyze and display all of the classified map products. Russell’s ‘climatic years’ concept was used and separate classifications were produce for each year of available data. Findings indicate that the oceans are very different from land areas when it comes to the location and extent of varying climate types. Some main findings include the idea that A, C, and E climates dominate the geography of the oceans and that there are zero continental, or D, climates. Also, the Southern Oscillation plays an important part in tropical ocean dynamics and climate, but summarizing twenty nine years of mapped patterns into a summary product removes any major effect from yearly climate system anomalies. A key finding is an argument that supports the establishment of a unique Southern Ocean surrounding Antarctica. There are polar, ET and EF, climate subtypes surrounding both the Arctic and Antarctic poles, but only the north has the well established Arctic Ocean. Oceanic E climate areas are more pronounced in the Southern Hemisphere with circumpolar rings around the Antarctic continent. Classification results support the idea of a Southern Ocean based on the spatial pattern of climate types and in view of the fact that that the climate of the Southern Ocean area is so different from the temperate, or C, climate and its subtypes. This research is important for many reasons, the primary being that climate classification helps us better understand the world around us. It is difficult to see change in the environment without first knowing what the state of the system used to be. Classification will also help depict the changes that have happened, when these shifts in climate occurred, and with that information we can better predict what the future will hold.

Master of Arts / Department of Geography / Kevin P. Price / Due primarily to changes in land management practices, eastern redcedar (Juniperus virginiana L.), a native Kansas conifer, is rapidly invading onto valuable rangelands. The suppression of fire and increase of intensive grazing, combined with the rapid growth rate, high reproductive output, and dispersal ability of the species have allowed it to dramatically expand beyond its original range. There is a growing interest in harvesting this species for use as a biofuel. For economic planning purposes, density and biomass quantities for the trees are needed. Three methods are explored for mapping eastern redcedar and quantifying its biomass in Riley County, Kansas. First, a land cover classification of redcedar cover is performed using a method that utilizes a support vector machine classifier applied to a multi-temporal stack of Landsat TM satellite images. Second, a Small Unmanned Aircraft System (sUAS) is used to measure individual redcedar trees in an area where they are encroaching into a pasture. Finally, a hybrid approach is used to estimate redcedar biomass using high resolution multispectral and light detection and ranging (LiDAR) imagery. These methods showed promise in the forestry, range management, and bioenergy industries for better understanding of an invasive species that shows great potential for use as a biofuel resource.

Master of Science / Department of Industrial & Manufacturing Systems Engineering / Jessica L. Heier Stamm / In many humanitarian and public health settings, multiple organizations act independently to locate facilities to serve an affected population. As a result of this decentralized decision-making environment, individuals’ access to facility resources may suffer in comparison to a hypothetical system in which a single planner locates the facilities to optimize access for all. Furthermore, due to the unanticipated nature of humanitarian events and the urgency of the need, responders often must cope with a high level of uncertainty regarding the future supply of resources and demand for relief. The contributions of this thesis address the challenges that arise due to the decentralized and dynamic nature of humanitarian response. The first goal of this research is to quantify the difference between decentralized system performance and that possible with a centralized planner. The second goal is to demonstrate the value and feasibility of using a dynamic, rolling-horizon framework to optimize facility location decisions over time. This work compares individuals’ access to health facilities resulting from location decisions made by decentralized decision-makers to the access achieved by a centralized model that optimizes access for all. Access is measured using a special case of the gravity model, the Enhanced Two-Step Floating Catchment Area (E2SFCA) method, which is a distance-weighted ratio of capacity to demand. The E2SFCA method is integrated with integer programming to optimize public access to health facilities. This method is applied to the location of cholera treatment facilities in Haiti, which has been afflicted with a cholera epidemic since October 2010. This research finds that access varied significantly across Haiti, and in the month of February 2011, thirty-seven of the 570 sections, representing 474,286 persons (4.8 percent of the population), did not have adequate access to cholera treatment facilities. Using centralized models to optimize accessibility, performance can be improved but no single model is dominant. This paper recommends use of an efficiency-oriented model in conjunction with an equity constraint to make facility location decisions in future responses. Finally, this work successfully integrates measures of access and equity into a rolling-horizon facility location model and demonstrates that these measures can be incorporated in a full-scale implementation to provide dynamic decision support to planners. This paper advocates for greater awareness of the impact of decentralization in humanitarian response and recommends that future work be undertaken to discover incentives and strategies to mitigate the impact of decentralization in future responses.

Ce travail de thèse de doctorat est placé dans le domaine de la Géovisualisation utilisé pour mettre en œuvre des systèmes de aide à la décision territoriale. Ce travail de recherche est né grâce à l'établissement d’un accord entre l’Université Tor Vergata de Rome, et l’INSA (Institut National des Sciences Appliquées), de Lyon. La co-tutelle de cette thèse est née pour la nécessité d’une approche multidisciplinaire à le sujet de recherche, en profitant des compétences en matière d'urbanisme, de l’environnement et de la modélisation de territoire à l'école doctorale ‘Geoinformazione’ de l'Université de Tor Vergata, et en utilisant d’avantage les compétences dans les systèmes d'information spatiale et de la géovisualisation au laboratoire LIRIS de l'INSA. Malgré ces avantages, l’un des problèmes les plus courants en visualisation de l’information est de représenter les données d’une manière claire et compréhensible. Actuallement il ya peu de fondations scientifiques pour guider les chercheurs dans la conception visuelle de données spatiales ; il existe des méthodes systématiques limitée pour évaluer l'efficacité des solutions proposées. Dans ce travail de recherche de doctorat, des contributions seront fournis à la création d'une méthode d'évaluation systématique pour évaluer et développer des affichages visuels efficaces. Dans ce contexte l’objectif de la recherche était de trouver une méthode simple et empirique - un test en ligne - qui pourrait être facilement reproductible pour differentes scenarios, pour soutenir l’administration publique dans différents contextes et pour différentes tâches. / This PhD research work is placed in the domain of Geovisualization used to implement Territorial Intelligence and decision support systems. This research work was born through the establishment of an agreement between Tor Vergata University, Rome, and INSA (Institut National des Sciences Appliquées), Lyon. The co-supervision of this thesis was born from the necessity of a multidisciplinary approach to the research topic, taking advantage of the skills in urban planning, environment and territory modeling at the Geoinformation doctoral school of Tor Vergata University, and taking advantage of the skills in Spatial Information Systems and Geovisualization at the LIRIS Laboratory of INSA. The motivation that led us to deal with this research topic was the perception of a lack of systematic methods and universally approved empirical experiments in data visualization domain. The experiments should consider different typologies of data, different environmental contexts, different indicators and methods of representations, etc., in order to support expert users in decision making, in the urban and territorial planning and in the implementation of environmental policies. In modern societies, we have to deal with a great amount of data every day and Geovisualization permits the management, exploration and display of big and heterogeneous data in an interactive way that facilitates decision making processes. Geovisualization gives the opportunity to the user to change the visual appearance of the maps, to explore different layers of data and to highlight problems in some areas by the citizens. Despite these advantages, one of the most common problems in Information Visualization is to represent data in a clear and comprehensible way. Spatial data have a complex structure that includes spatial component, thematic attributes, and often the temporal component Actually there are limited scientific foundations to guide researchers in visual design of spatial data, and there are limited systematic and standard methods to evaluate the effectiveness of the solutions proposed. In this Phd research work, some contributions will be provided to the creation of a systematic assessment method to evaluate and to develop effective geovisualization displays. An empirical evaluation test is proposed to assess the effectiveness of some map displays, analyzing the use of three elements of visual design: 1. the spatial indicators to be represented and their context of visualization, 2. the physical dimensions of map displays, 3. the visual variables to represent different layers of information.

Introdução: Na Agenda do Desenvolvimento Sustentável da ONU (2015), reiterou-se que dados e informações em meio digital e de fácil compartilhamento podem contribuir positivamente no alcance das metas e dos Objetivos do Desenvolvimento Sustentável (ODSs). O 6º ODS (água e saneamento para todos) estabelece a universalização dos serviços de água e esgoto e propõe indicadores, cujo monitoramento e alcance depende de dados e informações de qualidade com constante atualização. Dentre elas, destacam-se as informações geográficas, que revelam características de objetos e de fenômenos por meio do georreferenciamento e que vêm sendo gradativamente produzidas e empregadas em tais serviços. Objetivos: 1. Concepção de um método para órgãos responsáveis por serviços de água e esgoto em áreas metropolitanas, para verificar o grau de atendimento a requisitos relacionados ao uso e gestão de informações geográficas e orientar alternativas para melhoria, considerando-se a gestão organizacional das companhias e o contexto local/regional onde atuam. 2. Realizar estudo de três casos de companhias de água e esgoto em diferentes contextos internacionais, para verificar a aplicabilidade do método concebido. Métodos: 1 - Levantamento bibliográfico com abrangência global para suporte teórico e levantamento de questões; 2 - Elaboração de roteiro semiestruturado, com 56 requisitos de múltiplas respostas, de relevâncias direta ou indireta ao tema \"informações geográficas\"; 3 - Visitas técnicas em três órgãos de serviços de água e esgoto em metrópoles de três continentes distintos (Fortaleza - CE, Nairóbi - Quênia e Budapeste - Hungria), e aplicação do roteiro mediante entrevistas, com profissionais das companhias; 4 - Análise crítica e comparativa das respostas em conjunto, para cada requisito e atributo. Introdução: Na Agenda do Desenvolvimento Sustentável da ONU (2015), reiterou-se que dados e informações em meio digital e de fácil compartilhamento podem contribuir positivamente no alcance das metas e dos Objetivos do Desenvolvimento Sustentável (ODSs). O 6º ODS (água e saneamento para todos) estabelece a universalização dos serviços de água e esgoto e propõe indicadores, cujo monitoramento e alcance depende de dados e informações de qualidade com constante atualização. Dentre elas, destacam-se as informações geográficas, que revelam características de objetos e de fenômenos por meio do georreferenciamento e que vêm sendo gradativamente produzidas e empregadas em tais serviços. Objetivos: 1. Concepção de um método para órgãos responsáveis por serviços de água e esgoto em áreas metropolitanas, para verificar o grau de atendimento a requisitos relacionados ao uso e gestão de informações geográficas e orientar alternativas para melhoria, considerando-se a gestão organizacional das companhias e o contexto local/regional onde atuam. 2. Realizar estudo de três casos de companhias de água e esgoto em diferentes contextos internacionais, para verificar a aplicabilidade do método concebido. Métodos: 1 - Levantamento bibliográfico com abrangência global para suporte teórico e levantamento de questões; 2 - Elaboração de roteiro semiestruturado, com 56 requisitos de múltiplas respostas, de relevâncias direta ou indireta ao tema \"informações geográficas\"; 3 - Visitas técnicas em três órgãos de serviços de água e esgoto em metrópoles de três continentes distintos (Fortaleza - CE, Nairóbi - Quênia e Budapeste - Hungria), e aplicação do roteiro mediante entrevistas, com profissionais das companhias; 4 - Análise crítica e comparativa das respostas em conjunto, para cada requisito e atributo. Resultados: As três companhias apresentaram grandes disparidades em índices de atendimento dos serviços de água e esgoto, bem como em outros indicadores socioeconômicos, o que também se refletiu no atendimento dos requisitos, enquanto outros requisitos se mantiveram estáveis apesar das disparidades. Como recomendação sugere-se que o método da pesquisa possa ser aplicado em companhias do tipo para dar suporte ao cumprimento do 6º ODS em diferentes locais do mundo. / Introduction: The Sustainable Development Agenda of the UN (2015) emphasized that digital data and information easily shareable might contribute positively on reaching the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). The SDG 6 (water and sanitation for all) states universalized services of drinkable water and sewerage and proposes indexes, from which monitoring and success depend on high quality data and information, constantly updated. From those, geographic information is highlighted by revealing features about objects and events through georeferencing and they are gradually created and applied in such services. Goals: 1. Conception of a method for water and sewerage utilities in metropolitan areas, to verify the range on achieving requirements related to geographic information use and management and guideline improvements, considering organizational management and local/regional contexts where they work. 2. Accomplish three cases of water and sewerage utilities in different international contexts, to verify the applicability of the conceived method. Methods: 1 - Consulting literature worldwide for theoretical support and conception of questions and issues; 2 - Elaborate a semi structured script with 56 requirements of multiple answers, directly or indirectly related to the topic \"geographic information\"; 3 - Technical visits in three water and sewerage utilities in metropolitan areas of different continents (Fortaleza - Brazil, Nairobi - Kenya and Budapest - Hungary) and apply the script through interviews with their employees; 4 - Critical analysis and comparison of results for each requirement and attribute Results: The three utilities showed up a high disparity on indexes of water and sewerage services availability for their population, and also on socioeconomical indexes, which reflected on how they could achieve the requirements, meanwhile other requirements had similar results even with such differences. As an advice, the research method could be applied in water and sewerage utilities worldwide to support the 6th SDG.

Most data are associated with a place, and many are also associated with a moment in time, a time interval, or another linked temporal component. Spatiotemporal data (i.e., data with elements of both space and time) can be used to assess movement or change over time in a particular location, an approach that is useful across many disciplines. However, spatiotemporal data structures can be quite complex, and the datasets very large. Although GIS software programs are capable of processing and analyzing spatial information, most contain no (or minimal) features for handling temporal information and have limited capability to deal with large, complex multidimensional spatiotemporal data. A related problem is how to best represent spatiotemporal data to support efficient processing, analysis, and visualization. In the era of "big data," efficient methods for analyzing and visualizing large quantities of spatiotemporal data have become increasingly necessary. Automated processing approaches, when made scalable and generalizable, can result in much greater efficiency in spatiotemporal data analysis. The growing popularity of web services and server-side processing methods can be leveraged to create systems for processing spatiotemporal data on the server, with delivery of output products to the client. In many cases, the client can be a standard web browser, providing a common platform from which users can interact with complex server-side processing systems to produce specific output data and visualizations. The rise of complex JavaScript libraries for creating interactive client-side tools has enabled the development of rich internet applications (RIA) that provide interactive data exploration capabilities and an enhanced user experience within the web browser. Three projects involving time-series tsunami simulation data, potential human response in a tsunami evacuation scenario, and large sets of modeled time-series climate grids were conducted to explore automated web-based analysis, processing, and visualization of spatiotemporal data. Methods were developed for efficient handling of spatiotemporal data on the server side, as well as for interactive animation and visualization tools on the client side. The common web browser, particularly when combined with specialized server side code and client side RIA libraries, was found to be an effective platform for analysis and visualization tools that quickly interact with complex spatiotemporal data. Although specialized methods were developed to for each project, in most cases those methods can be generalized to other disciplines or computational domains where similar problem sets exist. / Graduation date: 2013