• User Working Group Assesses Data Needs
• New Five-Year Contract from NASA for SEDAC
• Use of CIESIN’s Data Following Recent Disasters Featured by NASA

User Working Group Assesses Data Needs

November 13, 2008

CIESIN convened members of the User Working Group (UWG) for the NASA Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center (SEDAC) for a meeting in New York November 13-14 to advise SEDAC on the most pressing needs for new integrated data products, improved data tools and services, and user training and capacity building. Key areas of discussion included the need for more detailed demographic data in gridded forms to support interdisciplinary research and applications and for expanded data and services useful for assessing vulnerability and adaptation to climate change.

On November 13, the UWG discussed African data needs with Pedro Sanchez, head of the Earth Institute's Tropical Agriculture and Rural Environment Program, and reviewed SEDAC's efforts in support of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Data Distribution Center (DDC) and the planned Global Earth Observing System of Systems (GEOSS). UWG members Chris Elvidge of NOAA's National Geophysical Data Center and Dale Quattrochi of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center gave updates on two proposed satellite missions that could significantly improve observations of human-environment interactions. On November 14, the UWG met with James Neal, Columbia's Vice President for Information Services and University Librarian, to discuss SEDAC's interactions with the Libraries on long-term digital data stewardship.

The UWG is led by Prof. Harlan Onsrud of the University of Maine and includes leading experts from the social, natural, health, and information sciences. Several representatives from NASA also participated in the meeting.

See: SEDAC User Working Group

New Five-Year Contract from NASA for SEDAC

July 31, 2008

CIESIN has been awarded a five-year contract for more than $20 million from NASA Goddard Space Flight Center to continue operating the Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center (SEDAC). Established in 1994, SEDAC is one of the Earth Science Data Centers in NASA’s Earth Observing System. SEDAC plays a unique role in integrating social science data and information with remote sensing data and in supporting diverse communities of researchers and applied users working at the intersection of the social and Earth sciences. SEDAC will continue to develop and maintain interdisciplinary data products and interactive applications such as its gridded population data products, environmental sustainability indicator collection, natural hazards data sets, climate change vulnerability data, and online and standalone mapping tools. SEDAC will also continue to host the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Socioeconomic Data Distribution Centre (DDC), the World Data Center for Human Interactions in the Environment of the International Council for Science (ICSU), and the Population-Environment Research Network (PERN).

The new NASA contract will enable CIESIN to enhance SEDAC’s standards-compliant Web mapping services and other interactive tools to support a range of research and operational systems dealing with disaster mitigation and response, conservation and land use, poverty and food security, and climate change vulnerability, impacts, adaptation, and mitigation. CIESIN will build on its partnerships with scientists at the Earth Institute and with the Columbia University Libraries to increase the longevity and depth of SEDAC’s data holdings and ensure their long-term preservation and accessibility. A key focus over the next five years will be to make SEDAC data and services accessible through the planned Global Earth Observing System of Systems, an international initiative of the Group on Earth Observations (GEO).

SEDAC will continue to provide direct support to users through its User Services office. The SEDAC User Working Group, chaired by Prof. Harlan Onsrud of the University of Maine, provides ongoing strategic advice and guidance to SEDAC activities. The contract performance period will extend through July 2013.

Use of CIESIN’s Data Following Recent Disasters Featured by NASA

June 13, 2008

A NASA Web feature, “NASA Data Helps Pinpoint Impacted Populations in Disaster Aftermath,” showcases the use of CIESIN’s population data and hazards data, as well as other data holdings, following the recent earthquake in China and cyclone Nargis in Burma (Myanmar). CIESIN director Robert Chen was interviewed for this feature.

Reporting on the cyclone, CNN televised May 7 a map of population density in Burma supplied by CIESIN to visualize the unusual route the cyclone took through the low-lying, densely populated Irawaddy delta. CIESIN also provided district-level population data for Burma to the World Health Organization. A map of China based on CIESIN’s population data accompanied an article in the May 13 Wall Street Journal (WSJ Online) comparing the location of the Sichuan province earthquakes and population centers in China. For a map illustrating an article on the vulnerability of children in both developing and developed countries, published May 27 in the Science Times section of The New York Times, CIESIN provided estimates of school-age populations around the world living in high-risk earthquake zones. These maps and analyses were produced by the Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center (SEDAC), which CIESIN operates wtih funding from NASA.

CIESIN and SEDAC work to make data accessible to a wide community of users. Data may be downloaded and visualized via a variety of map services, including Google Earth and NASA World Wind, and a custom map client.

See: NASA Web Feature
       Population density in region of Sichuan Province earthquake