Publications

Executive Summary The U.S. Geological Survey Earth Resources Observation and Science Calibration and Validation (Cal/Val) Center of Excellence (ECCOE) focuses on improving the accuracy, precision, calibration, and product quality of remote-sensing data, leveraging years of multiscale optical system geometric and radiometric calibration and characterization experience. The ECCOE Landsat...

Executive Summary This report addresses the system characterization of the Tanager satellite hyperspectral sensor created by Planet Labs PBC. and is part of a series of system characterization reports produced and delivered by the U.S. Geological Survey Earth Resources Observation and Science Cal/Val Center of Excellence. These reports present and detail the methodology and procedures...

Context The White Mountain Apache Tribe of the Fort Apache Reservation in Arizona manages their natural and cultural resources within a perpetually wildfire-risky environment. The Tribe’s values also extend beyond those of typical risk assessments to include the importance of cultural activities and sites, various recreational and revenue values, and culturally significant species...

To support conservation-focused research and management we developed a new 30-m resolution polygon data layer of the nonlacustrine and nonriverine islands of the United States, with associated attributes describing key physical and conservation geography characteristics. Islands were grouped into a three-tiered hierarchy of island regions (twelve), island provinces (twenty-eight), and...

Data on maps should retain accuracy regardless of scale. Yet, as cartographic lines are generalized, there can be impacts on properties such as topology, density, and planform geometry. Here, we investigate the use of the Scale Specific Sinuosity (S3) metric (Stanislawski et al., 2023) to evaluate the effects of line simplification on planform geometry, which is the bends of streams in...

Monitoring the extent of surface water features (hydrography), accurately storing them in databases, and representing them on topographic maps are essential for various applications such as navigation and policy-making for legislative boundaries and permitting. In this context, hydrographic data includes features that generally have water present or image data showing signs that water is...

Cartographic generalization reduces the complexity of geographic data to produce legible, smaller-scale displays that retain essential information and logical geographic patterns. Generalization is a vital process in topographic map production. An important challenge in this process is managing and evaluating consistency across scale in the density and spatial distribution of map...

The advent of generative AI exemplified by large language models (LLMs) opens new ways to represent and compute geographic information and transcends the process of geographic knowledge production, driving geographic information systems (GIS) towards autonomous GIS. Leveraging LLMs as the decision core, autonomous GIS can independently generate and execute geoprocessing workflows to...

Data annotation is the process of labeling data to show the outcome that a related data model should predict. In this study, annotation data were transformed into semantic graph triples, mainly for use with the Resource Description Framework (RDF), a type of entity-relationship-attribute data model for graph databases. The transformation of annotation data to semantic graph triples...

A geometric accuracy assessment of lidar data collected in eastern Iowa in 2019 as part of the 3D Elevation Program (3DEP) was conducted. The assessment involved evaluating interswath accuracy, same surface precision, point density, absolute accuracy, and consistency with adjacent 3DEP datasets. The results demonstrate that the data meet or exceed the quality level 2 specifications...

Recent advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) and deep learning enable more accurate, scalable, and automated mapping. This paper provides a comprehensive review of the applications of AI, particularly deep learning, in landslide inventory mapping. In addition to examining commonly used data sources and model architectures, we explore innovative strategies such as feature...

Before implementing nontoxic shot requirements for hunting waterfowl and American coots Fulica americana in the United States in 1991, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service monitored lead poisoning in waterfowl on federal and state wildlife hunting areas during 1983-1986. Federal and state collaborators collected gizzards and livers from 9,029 hunter-killed waterfowl (10 species of dabbling...