Study Plan by Wan Wen · 18. March 2011
Title: Representation of Dynamic Geographic Features
Affiliation: Department of Development and Planning, Aalborg University
Date: 5th, April, 2011
Time: 13:00 - 15:00
Place: Fibigerstræde 11, room 89
Supervisor: Erik Kjems
Opponent: Henning Sten Hansen
Summary:
This PhD project deals with the representation of dynamic geographic features (DGFs) in the context of 3D virtual global environment. A DGF is an entity that changes some of its properties with time, near or on the earth. Studying on the digital representation of DGFs is a fundamental access to organizing, analyzing and utilizing the data and information about the changing world. A rise of the significance and difficulties of this study has been noticed with the exponential growth of geographic data and the increasing requirements for better applications in the geographic information science (GISci) field.
This project looks into the representation of DGFs from the perspective of digital data structures and algorithms, and seeks for fundamental and generic solutions significant for geographic data modeling and sharing. Methodologically, this project is specifically based on an active research referred to as geographic managed objects (GMOs) at the Centre for 3D CeoInformation, Aalborg University. By taking advantages of the interoperability provided by the virtual machine mechanism, GMOs are developed as a new object-oriented method specifically for the representation of geographic features in the context of 3D virtual global environment. This methodology is characterized by being very flexible for data modeling and by facilitating a modular approach to interactive visualization, which are critical in order to model and present the nature of dynamics. As an extension of the GMOs, this PhD project focuses on the temporal characteristics of geographic features and their digital representation and data access methods in information platforms, and aims at a uniform way that makes the representation of DGFs more flexible, open and accessible.