From the category archives:
The recent news that a deadly PG&E gas line explosion was being blamed in part on the lack of reliable information in a mapping system has raised some issues about risk and liability. If you haven’t yet read the exposé by the San Francisco Chronicle that seems to assert that the database and mapping system [...]
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The U.S. Center for Disease Control (CDC) has launched a prototype “Chronic Disease GIS Exchange” website meant to provide a forum for sharing examples, ideas and techniques for using GIS to inform policy and document geographic disparities to help prevent heart disease, stroke and chronic diseases. The site includes GIS resources, GIS training, and a [...]
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Building on the popular United States Agency for International Development’s (USAID) HealthMap, the interface has now been extended to support a tool known as Predict to track the global outbreak of animal diseases that might jump to humans. The system is set to monitor health data from more than 50,000 websites, including news sites, the [...]
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Ushahidi, the crowd-sourced mapping platform, which launched during the disputed Kenya elections in 2007 is now in seven languages and is becoming a commercial venture, says founder Ory Okolloh. The program will remain free and open source, but there’s a hosted version and a services business to customize the platform. They have developed various platforms [...]
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The UN and World Bank have released a 250-page report today that details effective preparation for natural hazards, and warns that the economic damages caused by natural disasters are on the rise. In the report titled “Natural Hazards, UnNatural Disasters: The Economics of Effective Prevention,” there is an outline of steps to help reduce deaths [...]
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You may have watched the video that Esri’s Bill Davenhall gave at the TedMed Conference about linking your place history to your health. Now there’s a free iPhone and iPad app for that, with the new My Place History application. The iOS application allows you to pull together your place history along with details about [...]
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The idea of the Healing Cities Project comes from a coalition of health professionals and urban planners in Vancouver, BC that are focused on maximizing citizen health and wellness through the urban form. The idea is to create a framework that fully connects human beings’ physical, emotional and spiritual aspects to all dimensions of the [...]
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Canadian researchers at Dalhousie University, Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, have created a global map of fine particulate matter (PM2.5) that can get past the body’s normal defenses and penetrate deep into the lungs. The researchers bridged the lack of surface-based air pollution sensors in the developing world by using satellite data from NASA’s Multi-angle Imaging [...]
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As with all major disasters over the past decade, GIS has been central to assessment and response of the Gulf Oil Spill. The role of GIS became apparent from the offset, with calls from BP to employ GIS experts for contract assignments. The word spread quickly about these open positions, but little has been heard [...]
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The next generation of GPS satellites just began existence late Thursday night with the launch of the new GPS 2F-1, a solar-powered satellite designed for a 12-year mission. This new satellite has twice the signal accuracy of previous navigation satellites, and the new constellation will also contain a next-generation international search and rescue system called [...]
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