| 13 May 2015, 12.30 - 1.30pm Future for GNSS - Professor Terry Moore For many years now the only operational satellite navigation system has been GPS, and this has become accepted as the global standard. However, these days it is more appropriate to talk about Global Navigation Satellite Systems (GNSS), because the United States GPS has been joined by the Russian, European, Chinese, Indian and Japanese systems. Multi-constellation GNSS receivers are now starting to become readily available. During the 1990’s a number of professional grade GPS / GLONASS receivers were commercially available. But, these had quite a limited impact and with the dramatic decline in the number of GLONASS between 1995 and 2001 the interest in combined receivers waned. However, the last few years has seen a dramatic re-emergence of the development of GPS and GLONASS receivers. Indeed, many of this new generation of receivers are now truly multi-constellation receivers, and have the capability to operate with Galileo and BeiDou as these systems become operational. This presentation will review the current status and proposed modernisation of GPS with an emphasis on the benefits that the developments and new signals will bring to a variety of user domains. In a similar manner, the Russian GLONASS will also be described documenting the evolution to the system’s current status and the planned developments. The new European Galileo and Chinese BeiDou systems will be described along with consideration of the international efforts directed towards interoperability of all the global systems. Other nascent and proposed systems will also be introduced, such as IRNSS and QZSS. |
| 27 May 2015, 12.30 - 1.30pm Our New NGI Strategy: Another Chance to Have Your Say! - Professor Stuart Marsh A new research structure within the Faculty of Engineering will be introduced from the 1st of August 2015, with 5 Faculty lead priorities underpinned by research groups and institutes, like NGI. As part of this new structure, all research groups will implement a strategic plan within their own area. The key focus for the plan is to outline opportunities for growth and research excellence, and identify the support and resources required to deliver the research group’s vision and aspirations. We have been developing a new NGI strategy over the past six months, with two previous seminars focusing on the research that we will do, and then the partnerships that will underpin our work. This seminar will present the emerging NGI strategy and offer you opportunity to shape it further before it is submitted to Faculty Executive Board by the 16th of June 2015. |
| 10 June 2015, 12.30 - 1.30pm Open Geospatial Science - Dr Suchith Anand The last decade has seen a rapid growth in open source geospatial software, open standards and open data developments. Building upon the broader progress in open science, the synergies in the developments in open source geospatial software, open data, open standards, open hardware and open access to research publications have been key in accelerating the advancement for open geospatial science and applications. By combining the potential of free and open GI software, open data, open standards, open access to research publications, open hardware, etc. will enable the creation of a sustainable innovation ecosystem for advancing the discipline and accelerating new discoveries to help solve global cross disciplinary societal challenges from climate change mitigation to sustainable cities. Open Geospatial Science & Applications is especially important as it helps in empowerment of staff and students, capacity building, create openness in Geo Education for developing creative and open minds in students which is critical for building open innovation and contributes to building up Open Knowledge for the benefit of the whole society and for our future generations. |
| 24 June 2015, 12.30 - 1.30pm Participatory Mapping in the Rainforest - Julia Altenbuchner To date, most environmental monitoring in remote and sensitive ecosystems is carried out by conservation workers, government employees or scientists, but only exceptionally with the informed participation of local inhabitants. The objective of this research is to enable lay users, particularly people with low literacy levels and no culture in drawing or using maps, to play an active role in resource monitoring. Therefore, an icon-based mobile app, named Sapelli, was developed allowing forest-dwelling, indigenous communities to record their resources and potential violations thereof. The next challenge is to bring basic GIS functionality, such as map consultation, querying and editing, within reach of non-literate and novice map users. As part of this, an aerial image understanding experiment has been carried out with hunter-gatherer populations in the Congo Basin. |
| 8 July 2015, 12.30 - 1.30pm Frack Off! European Energy Security and Innovation in the Sentinel Age - Dr Andy Sowter The European Space Agency, the European Union and the European Environment Agency are launching a system of remote sensing satellites called the Sentinels to help monitor the global and local environment. This presentation shows how award-winning innovation at the NGI is utilising data from the first of these satellites, Sentinel-1, which was launched in April 2014 to provide solutions for today's policy makers and commercial operators in the challenging area of European energy security. |
| 22 July 2015, 12.30 - 1.30pm Roberto Santos - Spatial patterns in the genetic variation of Bambara groundnut In 2013, three crops: wheat, maize, and rice were responsible for almost 50% of harvested area globally. This is despite there being more than 7000 different crops available for cultivation worldwide. Improving the role of under-utilised crops in the agriculture activity can change this scenario. The Bambara groundnut is a rich source of protein and energy and is very tolerant of dry and rainy environments. The landraces available do not achieve the potential yield. It means that the Bambara groundnut suffers of the yield gap, and there are opportunities to improve the production. This presentation is about using different molecular marker types and high-resolution datasets of environmental data available to investigate how the environment and the spatial distribution of the Bambara groundnut interact with the processes of local adaptation and speciation. The results of the research may help the development of new varieties with desirable agronomical traits. A multi-sensor and multi-user collaborative indoor positioning approach - Julia Jing This presentation introduces a collaborative indoor positioning method for pedestrian indoor positioning and navigation by integrating multi-sensors and users. As a number of signals are now available in urban environments, the user must therefore go through a selection process before integrating measurements. This ensures that only the useful information are integrated and ensures system efficiency as well as positioning performance. Finally, a collaborative Wi-Fi fingerprint training approach is also introduced based on effective collaborative positioning. |
| 2 September 2015, 12.30 -1.30pm Let's have Fuzzy Logic Approach to GIS Concepts - Dr Amir Pourabdollah & Christian Wagner |
| 16 September 2015, 12.30 - 1.30pm Dr Gary Priestnall - Topic TBA |
| 30 September 2015, 12.30 - 13.30 Kite Mapping - Cindy Regalado
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