19. Establishment of Gridded Data Sets for Global Change and Biological Conservation Studies

Global environmental change and biological conservation research relies on a wide variety of environmental data. Frequently, however, the various types of environmental data have different spatial and temporal resolutions making it difficult for researchers to synthesize information across different data types. The goal of this Mendenhall position is to develop the methods and corresponding tools necessary to integrate a wide variety of spatial data sets in a common data framework that enables the scientific, management, and policy communities to efficiently conduct data analysis, model parameterization, modeling, and data modeling comparisons. In particular, it is hoped that this initial framework will eventually evolve to provide the basis for national and international research syntheses and assessments using past, present, and projected future inputs. This data framework will also permit direct comparisons of the results of related studies using different methods (for example, climate interpolations done using different numerical approaches).

The successful Mendenhall candidate will work with the USGS Climate Change, Land Use and Environmental Sensitivity (CLUES) Project and the USGS Geographic Analysis and Monitoring (GAM) Program to develop the methods for integrating a variety of existing environmental data sets, including:

• Present-day data sets: elevation; climate (e.g., long-term average and historic climate); bioclimate; land cover and land use; derived biophysical variables; soil characteristics; NDVI; glaciers; water bodies; VEMAP and other vegetation data sets (including plant species distributions); ecoregions; and vulnerability analysis data sets (socio-economic data, etc.).
• Paleogeographic data sets: past sea-level, glacial, and lacustrine distributions; land surface characteristics; past biomes (from paleontological data); paleoenvironmental and paleoclimatic inferences from geologic data; and model simulations of past climatic conditions.
• Simulations of future conditions: potential future climatic conditions simulated by different models under different future scenarios; and potential effects of climatic change on species distributions, water resources, fire regimes, and other environmental factors.

These data sets will be used to develop derivative data sets and tools that permit users to work across spatial scales, projections, and levels of specificity (or abstraction) in the data. Our initial plan involves: 1) development of integrated data sets at three different co-registered spatial scales (ca. 25 km, 10 km, and 1 km); 2) categorization of the data (where appropriate) at three different levels from general to specific; and 3) the use of North America as the initial case study for data set development and application. Creation of the data sets will involve not only the mechanics of data aggregation, interpolation, concatenation, and projection but, more importantly, assessment of which data sets can wisely be manipulated in these ways, and which data sets have meaning only at specific scales. Our aim is to provide the scientific, management, and policy communities with well-documented data sets (not "on the fly" research data sets) and well-tested and documented tools for the manipulation and analysis of data.

We seek a Mendenhall postdoctoral researcher to work with CLUES, GAM, and related communities to design, create, and test the concepts, data, and tools involved in this effort. Specifically, this individual will address the scientific and methodological issues involved in integrating data across: spatial scales, diverse types of data, and quantification methods, and thus some background in GIScience is desirable. Prior experience with spatial environmental data is also important, although the postdoctoral researcher will spearhead the development of expert user panels to provide additional expertise for assessing and refining the data sets and tools. The postdoctoral researcher will collaborate with USGS researchers to develop a tool kit of interactive resolution/projection conversion software that will allow users to convert the data sets into different scales and formats, although the postdoctoral researcher will not be directly involved in software development.

Proposed Duty Station: Denver, CO

Areas of Ph.D.: Geology, geography

Qualifications: Applicants must meet one of the following qualifications: Research Geologist, Research Geographer

(This type of research is performed by those who have backgrounds for the occupations stated above. However, other titles may be applicable depending on the applicant's background, education, and research proposal. The final classification of the position will be made by the Personnel specialist.)

Research Advisor(s): Robert Thompson, (303) 236-5347, rthompson@usgs.gov; Thomas Loveland, (605) 594-6066, loveland@usgs.gov; Sarah Shafer, (541) 754-4498, sshafer@usgs.gov

Personnel Office contact: Kathleen Scheich, (303) 236-9581, kscheich@usgs.gov

Summary of Opportunities