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Volume 5
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ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf., Volume 5, Issue 10 (October 2016) – 28 articles

Cover Story (view full-size image): Information on the motion behavior of environmental phenomena is important in a number of applications, e.g. in precipitation now-casting or the analysis of ocean dynamics. Often, motion information is derived from images, such as weather radar, or infrared satellite images of the sea surface temperature. However, it is not always possible to detect the phenomena by remote sensing techniques and to generate such images. The research that is described in the publication "Field Motion Estimation with a Geosensor Network" is concerned with development of an algorithm for the decentralized estimation of the motion of dynamic spatio-temporal fields by the nodes of a geosensor network. A reliable and well-known optical flow algorithm is used as the basis and adjusted to the specifics of GSNs and spatio-temporal fields, such as the irregularity of samples and the strong constraints on communication and [...] Read more.
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12048 KiB  
Article
A Framework for Discovering Evolving Domain Related Spatio-Temporal Patterns in Twitter
by Yan Shi, Min Deng, Xuexi Yang, Qiliang Liu, Liang Zhao and Chang-Tien Lu
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 193; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100193 - 18 Oct 2016
Cited by 8 | Viewed by 6004
Abstract
In massive Twitter datasets, tweets deriving from different domains, e.g., civil unrest, can be extracted to constitute spatio-temporal Twitter events for spatio-temporal distribution pattern detection. Existing algorithms generally employ scan statistics to detect spatio-temporal hotspots from Twitter events and do not consider the [...] Read more.
In massive Twitter datasets, tweets deriving from different domains, e.g., civil unrest, can be extracted to constitute spatio-temporal Twitter events for spatio-temporal distribution pattern detection. Existing algorithms generally employ scan statistics to detect spatio-temporal hotspots from Twitter events and do not consider the spatio-temporal evolving process of Twitter events. In this paper, a framework is proposed to discover evolving domain related spatio-temporal patterns from Twitter data. Given a target domain, a dynamic query expansion is employed to extract related tweets to form spatio-temporal Twitter events. The new spatial clustering approach proposed here is based on the use of multi-level constrained Delaunay triangulation to capture the spatial distribution patterns of Twitter events. An additional spatio-temporal clustering process is then performed to reveal spatio-temporal clusters and outliers that are evolving into spatial distribution patterns. Extensive experiments on Twitter datasets related to an outbreak of civil unrest in Mexico demonstrate the effectiveness and practicability of the new method. The proposed method will be helpful to accurately predict the spatio-temporal evolution process of Twitter events, which belongs to a deeper geographical analysis of spatio-temporal Big Data. Full article
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6301 KiB  
Article
Granulometric Analysis on Remote Sensing Images: Application to Mapping Retrospective Changes in the Sahelian Ligneous Cover
by José Luis San Emeterio and Catherine Mering
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 192; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100192 - 13 Oct 2016
Cited by 2 | Viewed by 4207
Abstract
This paper illustrates how the use of mathematical morphology can be a powerful tool for the mapping of ligneous cover in semi-arid lands. Ligneous cover plays a fundamental role in Sahel semi-arid regions since this resource is vital to the resilience of rural [...] Read more.
This paper illustrates how the use of mathematical morphology can be a powerful tool for the mapping of ligneous cover in semi-arid lands. Ligneous cover plays a fundamental role in Sahel semi-arid regions since this resource is vital to the resilience of rural societies and can be used as an indicator of socio-environmental conditions. Grey tone vertical images from Sahelian villages in 1975 and 2010/2011 have been selected to perform a diachronic analysis to test the method. Granulometric profiles have been calculated for each pixel and then an unsupervised classification has been performed to obtain k classes that account for ligneous patches of different sizes. This method is particularly successful when the most recent images are used, given that these have better contrast and sharpness. Nested classifications were required to accomplish the ligneous mapping of images from 1975. The accuracy assessment for the most recent images classifications shows satisfactory results. The classification of ligneous cover according to different sizes is important for a better understanding of the ligneous dynamics. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Mathematical Morphology in Geoinformatics)
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4755 KiB  
Article
Landslide Susceptibility Mapping Based on Particle Swarm Optimization of Multiple Kernel Relevance Vector Machines: Case of a Low Hill Area in Sichuan Province, China
by Yongliang Lin, Kewen Xia, Xiaoqing Jiang, Jianchuan Bai and Panpan Wu
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 191; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100191 - 13 Oct 2016
Cited by 8 | Viewed by 4890
Abstract
In this paper, we propose a multiple kernel relevance vector machine (RVM) method based on the adaptive cloud particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm to map landslide susceptibility in the low hill area of Sichuan Province, China. In the multi-kernel structure, the kernel selection [...] Read more.
In this paper, we propose a multiple kernel relevance vector machine (RVM) method based on the adaptive cloud particle swarm optimization (PSO) algorithm to map landslide susceptibility in the low hill area of Sichuan Province, China. In the multi-kernel structure, the kernel selection problem can be solved by adjusting the kernel weight, which determines the single kernel contribution of the final kernel mapping. The weights and parameters of the multi-kernel function were optimized using the PSO algorithm. In addition, the convergence speed of the PSO algorithm was increased using cloud theory. To ensure the stability of the prediction model, the result of a five-fold cross-validation method was used as the fitness of the PSO algorithm. To verify the results, receiver operating characteristic curves (ROC) and landslide dot density (LDD) were used. The results show that the model that used a heterogeneous kernel (a combination of two different kernel functions) had a larger area under the ROC curve (0.7616) and a lower prediction error ratio (0.28%) than did the other types of kernel models employed in this study. In addition, both the sum of two high susceptibility zone LDDs (6.71/100 km2) and the sum of two low susceptibility zone LDDs (0.82/100 km2) demonstrated that the landslide susceptibility map based on the heterogeneous kernel model was closest to the historical landslide distribution. In conclusion, the results obtained in this study can provide very useful information for disaster prevention and land-use planning in the study area. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advanced Geo-Information Technologies for Anticipatory Computing)
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4865 KiB  
Article
Location Optimization Using a Hierarchical Location-Allocation Model for Trauma Centers in Shenzhen, China
by Yishu Zhu, Qingyun Du, Fei Tian, Fu Ren, Shi Liang and Yan Chen
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 190; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100190 - 11 Oct 2016
Cited by 12 | Viewed by 6407
Abstract
Trauma is considered a “modern civilized sickness”, and its occurrence substantially affects all of society, as well as individuals. The implementation of trauma emergency systems in cities with young, prosperous, and highly mobile populations is necessary and significant. A complete trauma emergency system [...] Read more.
Trauma is considered a “modern civilized sickness”, and its occurrence substantially affects all of society, as well as individuals. The implementation of trauma emergency systems in cities with young, prosperous, and highly mobile populations is necessary and significant. A complete trauma emergency system includes both low-level trauma centers that offer basic emergency services and high-level trauma centers that offer comprehensive services. GIS and operational research methods were used to solve the location problem associated with these centers. This study analyzed the spatial distribution characteristics of trauma demands and the candidate locations of trauma centers based on a spatial analysis and presented a hierarchical location-allocation model for low- and high-level trauma centers in Shenzhen. The response, coverage, treatment and cost capacities of the trauma center locations were considered, and an ant colony optimization was used to calculate the optimal solution. The objectives of this study were to optimize trauma center locations, improve the allocation of medical trauma resources and reduce the rate of deaths and disabilities due to trauma. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Intelligent Spatial Decision Support)
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7132 KiB  
Article
Hidden Naive Bayes Indoor Fingerprinting Localization Based on Best-Discriminating AP Selection
by Chunjing Song, Jian Wang and Guan Yuan
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 189; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100189 - 10 Oct 2016
Cited by 24 | Viewed by 5923
Abstract
Indoor fingerprinting localization approaches estimate the location of a mobile object by matching observations of received signal strengths (RSS) from access points (APs) with fingerprint records. In real WLAN environments, there are more and more APs available, with interference between them, which increases [...] Read more.
Indoor fingerprinting localization approaches estimate the location of a mobile object by matching observations of received signal strengths (RSS) from access points (APs) with fingerprint records. In real WLAN environments, there are more and more APs available, with interference between them, which increases the localization difficulty and computational consumption. To cope with this, a novel AP selection method, LocalReliefF-C( a novel method based on ReliefF and correlation coefficient), is proposed. Firstly, on each reference location, the positioning capability of APs is ranked by calculating classification weights. Then, redundant APs are removed via computing the correlations between APs. Finally, the set of best-discriminating APs of each reference location is obtained, which will be used as the input features when the location is estimated. Furthermore, an effective clustering method is adopted to group locations into clusters according to the common subsets of the best-discriminating APs of these locations. In the online stage, firstly, the sequence of RSS observations is collected to calculate the set of the best-discriminating APs on the given location, which is subsequently used to compare with cluster keys in order to determine the target cluster. Then, hidden naive Bayes (HNB) is introduced to estimate the target location, which depicts the real WLAN environment more accurately and takes into account the mutual interaction of the APs. The experiments are conducted in the School of Environmental Science and Spatial Informatics at the China University of Mining and Technology. The results validate the effectiveness of the proposed methods on improving localization accuracy and reducing the computational consumption. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Location-Based Services)
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3604 KiB  
Article
Data Association at the Level of Narrative Plots to Support Analysis of Spatiotemporal Evolvement of Conflict: A Case Study in Nigeria
by Size Bi, Xiaoyu Han, Jing Tian, Xiao Liang, Yang Wang and Tinglei Huang
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 188; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100188 - 10 Oct 2016
Viewed by 5028
Abstract
Open data sources regarding conflicts are increasingly enriched by broad social media; these yield a volume of information that exceeds our process capabilities. One of the critical factors is that knowledge extraction from mixed data formats requires systematic, sophisticated modeling. Here, we propose [...] Read more.
Open data sources regarding conflicts are increasingly enriched by broad social media; these yield a volume of information that exceeds our process capabilities. One of the critical factors is that knowledge extraction from mixed data formats requires systematic, sophisticated modeling. Here, we propose using text mining modeling tools for building associations of heterogeneous semi-structured data to enhance decision-making. Using narrative plots, text representation, and cluster analysis, we provide a data association framework that can mine spatiotemporal data that occur in similar contexts. The framework contains the following steps: (1) a novel text representation is presented to vectorize the textual semantics by learning both co-word features and word orders in a unified form; (2) text clustering technology is employed to associate events of interest with similar events in historical logs, based solely on narrative plots of the events; and (3) the inferred activity procedure is visualized via an evolving spatiotemporal map through the Kriging algorithm. Our results demonstrate that the approach enables deeper discrimination into the trends underlying conflicts and possesses a narrative reasoning forward prediction with a precision of 0.4817, in addition to a high consistency with the conclusions of existing studies. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Intelligent Spatial Decision Support)
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9063 KiB  
Article
Exploring Multi-Scale Spatiotemporal Twitter User Mobility Patterns with a Visual-Analytics Approach
by Junjun Yin, Yizhao Gao, Zhenhong Du and Shaowen Wang
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 187; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100187 - 10 Oct 2016
Cited by 22 | Viewed by 6281 | Correction
Abstract
Understanding human mobility patterns is of great importance for urban planning, traffic management, and even marketing campaign. However, the capability of capturing detailed human movements with fine-grained spatial and temporal granularity is still limited. In this study, we extracted high-resolution mobility data from [...] Read more.
Understanding human mobility patterns is of great importance for urban planning, traffic management, and even marketing campaign. However, the capability of capturing detailed human movements with fine-grained spatial and temporal granularity is still limited. In this study, we extracted high-resolution mobility data from a collection of over 1.3 billion geo-located Twitter messages. Regarding the concerns of infringement on individual privacy, such as the mobile phone call records with restricted access, the dataset is collected from publicly accessible Twitter data streams. In this paper, we employed a visual-analytics approach to studying multi-scale spatiotemporal Twitter user mobility patterns in the contiguous United States during the year 2014. Our approach included a scalable visual-analytics framework to deliver efficiency and scalability in filtering large volume of geo-located tweets, modeling and extracting Twitter user movements, generating space-time user trajectories, and summarizing multi-scale spatiotemporal user mobility patterns. We performed a set of statistical analysis to understand Twitter user mobility patterns across multi-level spatial scales and temporal ranges. In particular, Twitter user mobility patterns measured by the displacements and radius of gyrations of individuals revealed multi-scale or multi-modal Twitter user mobility patterns. By further studying such mobility patterns in different temporal ranges, we identified both consistency and seasonal fluctuations regarding the distance decay effects in the corresponding mobility patterns. At the same time, our approach provides a geo-visualization unit with an interactive 3D virtual globe web mapping interface for exploratory geo-visual analytics of the multi-level spatiotemporal Twitter user movements. Full article
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6104 KiB  
Article
Forest Vertical Parameter Estimation Using PolInSAR Imagery Based on Radiometric Correction
by Yu Zhang, Chu He, Xin Xu and Dong Chen
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 186; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100186 - 10 Oct 2016
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 5333
Abstract
This work introduces an innovative radiometric terrain correction algorithm using PolInSAR imagery for improving forest vertical structure parameter estimation. The variance of radar backscattering caused by terrain undulation has been considered in this research by exploiting an iteration optimization procedure to improve the [...] Read more.
This work introduces an innovative radiometric terrain correction algorithm using PolInSAR imagery for improving forest vertical structure parameter estimation. The variance of radar backscattering caused by terrain undulation has been considered in this research by exploiting an iteration optimization procedure to improve the backscattering estimation for a Synthetic Aperture Radar (SAR) image. To eliminate the variance of backscatter coefficients caused by the local incident angle, a radiometric normalization algorithm has been investigated to compensate the influence of terrain on backscattering values, which hinders forest vertical parameter estimation. In vertical parameter estimation, species diversity and the spatial distribution of different vegetation have been modeled. Then, a combination of Fisher’s Alpha-Diversity model parameter estimation and the three-stage inversion method was designed for the vertical structure parameter. To demonstrate the efficiency of the proposed method in forest height estimation, the classical phase difference and three-stage inversion approach have been performed for the purpose of comparison. The proposed algorithm is tested on ALOS PALSAR (Advanced Land Observing Satellite Phased Array type L-band Synthetic Aperture Radar) and RADARSAT-2 (Radio Direction and Range Satellite 2) data sets for the Great Xing’an Mountain area and BioSAR (Biomass Synthetic Aperture Radar) 2007 data sets for the Remningstorp area. Height estimation results have also been validated using in-situ measurements. Experiments indicate the proposed method has the ability to compensate the influence of terrain undulation and improving the accuracy of forest vertical structure parameter estimation. Full article
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6601 KiB  
Article
Methodology for the Efficient Progressive Distribution and Visualization of 3D Building Objects
by Bo Mao and Lars Harrie
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 185; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100185 - 10 Oct 2016
Cited by 8 | Viewed by 5692
Abstract
Three-dimensional (3D), city models have been applied in a variety of fields. One of the main problems in 3D city model utilization, however, is the large volume of data. In this paper, a method is proposed to generalize the 3D building objects in [...] Read more.
Three-dimensional (3D), city models have been applied in a variety of fields. One of the main problems in 3D city model utilization, however, is the large volume of data. In this paper, a method is proposed to generalize the 3D building objects in 3D city models at different levels of detail, and to combine multiple Levels of Detail (LODs) for a progressive distribution and visualization of the city models. First, an extended structure for multiple LODs of building objects, BuildingTree, is introduced that supports both single buildings and building groups; second, constructive solid geometry (CSG) representations of buildings are created and generalized. Finally, the BuildingTree is stored in the NoSQL database MongoDB for dynamic visualization requests. The experimental results indicate that the proposed progressive method can efficiently visualize 3D city models, especially for large areas. Full article
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14853 KiB  
Article
Unmanned Aerial Vehicle Route Planning in the Presence of a Threat Environment Based on a Virtual Globe Platform
by Ming Zhang, Chen Su, Yuan Liu, Mingyuan Hu and Yuesheng Zhu
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 184; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100184 - 10 Oct 2016
Cited by 20 | Viewed by 5234
Abstract
Route planning is a key technology for an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) to fly reliably and safely in the presence of a threat environment. Existing route planning methods are mainly based on the simulation scene, whereas approaches based on the virtual globe platform [...] Read more.
Route planning is a key technology for an unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV) to fly reliably and safely in the presence of a threat environment. Existing route planning methods are mainly based on the simulation scene, whereas approaches based on the virtual globe platform have rarely been reported. In this paper, a new planning space for the virtual globe and the planner is proposed and a common threat model is constructed for threats including a no-fly zone, hazardous weather, radar coverage area, missile killing zone and dynamic threats. Additionally, an improved ant colony optimization (ACO) algorithm is developed to enhance route planning efficiency and terrain masking ability. Our route planning methods are optimized on the virtual globe platform for practicability. A route planning system and six types of planners were developed and implemented on the virtual globe platform. Finally, our evaluation results demonstrate that our optimum planner has better performance in terms of fuel consumption, terrain masking, and risk avoidance. Experiments also demonstrate that the method and system described in this paper can be used to perform global route planning and mission operations. Full article
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3568 KiB  
Article
User Generated Spatial Content-Integrator: Conceptual Model to Integrate Data from Diverse Sources of User Generated Spatial Content
by Jacinto Estima and Marco Painho
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 183; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100183 - 9 Oct 2016
Cited by 9 | Viewed by 5042
Abstract
Geographic information has been traditionally produced by mapping agencies and corporations, using highly skilled professionals as well as expensive precision equipment and procedures, in a very costly approach. The production of land use and land cover databases is just one example of such [...] Read more.
Geographic information has been traditionally produced by mapping agencies and corporations, using highly skilled professionals as well as expensive precision equipment and procedures, in a very costly approach. The production of land use and land cover databases is just one example of such traditional approaches. At the same time, the amount of Geographic Information created and shared by citizens through the web has been increasing exponentially during the last decade as a result of the emergence and popularization of technologies such as the Web 2.0, cloud computing, global positioning systems (GPS), smart phones, among others. This vast amount of free geographic data might have valuable information to extract. Combining data from several initiatives might further increase the value of such data. We propose a conceptual model to integrate data from suitable user generated spatial content initiatives. A prototype to demonstrate the ability of the model to perform such integration, based on two identified use cases, was also developed. Full article
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4027 KiB  
Article
Smartphone-Based Pedestrian’s Avoidance Behavior Recognition towards Opportunistic Road Anomaly Detection
by Tsuyoshi Ishikawa and Kaori Fujinami
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 182; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100182 - 3 Oct 2016
Cited by 8 | Viewed by 5328
Abstract
Road anomalies, such as cracks, pits and puddles, have generally been identified by citizen reports made by e-mail or telephone; however, it is difficult for administrative entities to locate the anomaly for repair. An advanced smartphone-based solution that sends text and/or image reports [...] Read more.
Road anomalies, such as cracks, pits and puddles, have generally been identified by citizen reports made by e-mail or telephone; however, it is difficult for administrative entities to locate the anomaly for repair. An advanced smartphone-based solution that sends text and/or image reports with location information is not a long-lasting solution, because it depends on people’s active reporting. In this article, we show an opportunistic sensing-based system that uses a smartphone for road anomaly detection without any active user involvement. To detect road anomalies, we focus on pedestrians’ avoidance behaviors, which are characterized by changing azimuth patterns. Three typical avoidance behaviors are defined, and random forest is chosen as the classifier. Twenty-nine features are defined, in which features calculated by splitting a segment into the first half and the second half and considering the monotonicity of change were proven to be effective in recognition. Experiments were carried out under an ideal and controlled environment. Ten-fold cross-validation shows an average classification performance with an F-measure of 0.89 for six activities. The proposed recognition method was proven to be robust against the size of obstacles, and the dependency on the storing position of a smartphone can be handled by an appropriate classifier per storing position. Furthermore, an analysis implies that the classification of data from an “unknown” person can be improved by taking into account the compatibility of a classifier. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Applications of Internet of Things)
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2160 KiB  
Article
Vehicle Positioning and Speed Estimation Based on Cellular Network Signals for Urban Roads
by Wei-Kuang Lai and Ting-Huan Kuo
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 181; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100181 - 2 Oct 2016
Cited by 11 | Viewed by 4484
Abstract
In recent years, cellular floating vehicle data (CFVD) has been a popular traffic information estimation technique to analyze cellular network data and to provide real-time traffic information with higher coverage and lower cost. Therefore, this study proposes vehicle positioning and speed estimation methods [...] Read more.
In recent years, cellular floating vehicle data (CFVD) has been a popular traffic information estimation technique to analyze cellular network data and to provide real-time traffic information with higher coverage and lower cost. Therefore, this study proposes vehicle positioning and speed estimation methods to capture CFVD and to track mobile stations (MS) for intelligent transportation systems (ITS). Three features of CFVD, which include the IDs, sequence, and cell dwell time of connected cells from the signals of MS communication, are extracted and analyzed. The feature of sequence can be used to judge urban road direction, and the feature of cell dwell time can be applied to discriminate proximal urban roads. The experiment results show the accuracy of the proposed vehicle positioning method, which is 100% better than other popular machine learning methods (e.g., naive Bayes classification, decision tree, support vector machine, and back-propagation neural network). Furthermore, the accuracy of the proposed method with all features (i.e., the IDs, sequence, and cell dwell time of connected cells) is 83.81% for speed estimation. Therefore, the proposed methods based on CFVD are suitable for detecting the status of urban road traffic. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Applications of Internet of Things)
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1790 KiB  
Article
Forecasting Public Transit Use by Crowdsensing and Semantic Trajectory Mining: Case Studies
by Ningyu Zhang, Huajun Chen, Xi Chen and Jiaoyan Chen
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 180; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100180 - 30 Sep 2016
Cited by 28 | Viewed by 5927
Abstract
With the growing development of smart cities, public transit forecasting has begun to attract significant attention. In this paper, we propose an approach for forecasting passenger boarding choices and public transit passenger flow. Our prediction model is based on mining common user behaviors [...] Read more.
With the growing development of smart cities, public transit forecasting has begun to attract significant attention. In this paper, we propose an approach for forecasting passenger boarding choices and public transit passenger flow. Our prediction model is based on mining common user behaviors for semantic trajectories and enriching features using knowledge from geographic and weather data. All the experimental data comes from the Ridge Nantong Limited bus company and Alibaba platform which is also open to the public. We evaluate our approach using various data sources, including point of interest (POI), weather condition, and public bus information in Guangzhou to demonstrate its effectiveness. Experimental results show that our proposal performs better than baselines in the prediction of passenger boarding choices and public transit passenger flow. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Geosensor Networks and Sensor Web)
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4046 KiB  
Article
An Integrated Software Framework to Support Semantic Modeling and Reasoning of Spatiotemporal Change of Geographical Objects: A Use Case of Land Use and Land Cover Change Study
by Wenwen Li, Xiran Zhou and Sheng Wu
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 179; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100179 - 30 Sep 2016
Cited by 12 | Viewed by 6164
Abstract
Evolving Earth observation and change detection techniques enable the automatic identification of Land Use and Land Cover Change (LULCC) over a large extent from massive amounts of remote sensing data. It at the same time poses a major challenge in effective organization, representation [...] Read more.
Evolving Earth observation and change detection techniques enable the automatic identification of Land Use and Land Cover Change (LULCC) over a large extent from massive amounts of remote sensing data. It at the same time poses a major challenge in effective organization, representation and modeling of such information. This study proposes and implements an integrated computational framework to support the modeling, semantic and spatial reasoning of change information with regard to space, time and topology. We first proposed a conceptual model to formally represent the spatiotemporal variation of change data, which is essential knowledge to support various environmental and social studies, such as deforestation and urbanization studies. Then, a spatial ontology was created to encode these semantic spatiotemporal data in a machine-understandable format. Based on the knowledge defined in the ontology and related reasoning rules, a semantic platform was developed to support the semantic query and change trajectory reasoning of areas with LULCC. This semantic platform is innovative, as it integrates semantic and spatial reasoning into a coherent computational and operational software framework to support automated semantic analysis of time series data that can go beyond LULC datasets. In addition, this system scales well as the amount of data increases, validated by a number of experimental results. This work contributes significantly to both the geospatial Semantic Web and GIScience communities in terms of the establishment of the (web-based) semantic platform for collaborative question answering and decision-making. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Geospatial Semantics and Semantic Web)
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5773 KiB  
Article
Real-Time Spatial Queries for Moving Objects Using Storm Topology
by Feng Zhang, Ye Zheng, Dengping Xu, Zhenhong Du, Yingzhi Wang, Renyi Liu and Xinyue Ye
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 178; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100178 - 29 Sep 2016
Cited by 27 | Viewed by 7058
Abstract
With the rapid development of mobile data acquisition technology, the volume of available spatial data is growing at an increasingly fast pace. The real-time processing of big spatial data has become a research frontier in the field of Geographic Information Systems (GIS). To [...] Read more.
With the rapid development of mobile data acquisition technology, the volume of available spatial data is growing at an increasingly fast pace. The real-time processing of big spatial data has become a research frontier in the field of Geographic Information Systems (GIS). To cope with these highly dynamic data, we aim to reduce the time complexity of data updating by modifying the traditional spatial index. However, existing algorithms and data structures are based on single work nodes, which are incapable of handling the required high numbers and update rates of moving objects. In this paper, we present a distributed spatial index based on Apache Storm, an open-source distributed real-time computation system. Using this approach, we compare the range and K-nearest neighbor (KNN) query efficiency of four spatial indexes on a single dataset and introduce a method of performing spatial joins between two moving datasets. In particular, we build a secondary distributed index for spatial join queries based on the grid-partition index. Finally, a series of experiments are presented to explore the factors that affect the performance of the distributed index and to demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed distributed index based on Storm. As a real-world application, this approach has been integrated into an information system that provides real-time traffic decision support. Full article
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5436 KiB  
Article
Understanding Spatiotemporal Patterns of Human Convergence and Divergence Using Mobile Phone Location Data
by Xiping Yang, Zhixiang Fang, Yang Xu, Shih-Lung Shaw, Zhiyuan Zhao, Ling Yin, Tao Zhang and Yunong Lin
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 177; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100177 - 28 Sep 2016
Cited by 52 | Viewed by 8081
Abstract
Investigating human mobility patterns can help researchers and agencies understand the driving forces of human movement, with potential benefits for urban planning and traffic management. Recent advances in location-aware technologies have provided many new data sources (e.g., mobile phone and social media data) [...] Read more.
Investigating human mobility patterns can help researchers and agencies understand the driving forces of human movement, with potential benefits for urban planning and traffic management. Recent advances in location-aware technologies have provided many new data sources (e.g., mobile phone and social media data) for studying human space-time behavioral regularity. Although existing studies have utilized these new datasets to characterize human mobility patterns from various aspects, such as predicting human mobility and monitoring urban dynamics, few studies have focused on human convergence and divergence patterns within a city. This study aims to explore human spatial convergence and divergence and their evolutions over time using large-scale mobile phone location data. Using a dataset from Shenzhen, China, we developed a method to identify spatiotemporal patterns of human convergence and divergence. Eight distinct patterns were extracted, and the spatial distributions of these patterns are discussed in the context of urban functional regions. Thus, this study investigates urban human convergence and divergence patterns and their relationships with the urban functional environment, which is helpful for urban policy development, urban planning and traffic management. Full article
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14931 KiB  
Article
Indexing for Moving Objects in Multi-Floor Indoor Spaces That Supports Complex Semantic Queries
by Hui Lin, Ling Peng, Si Chen, Tianyue Liu and Tianhe Chi
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 176; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100176 - 27 Sep 2016
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 5151
Abstract
With the emergence of various types of indoor positioning technologies (e.g., radio-frequency identification, Wi-Fi, and iBeacon), how to rapidly retrieve indoor cells and moving objects has become a key factor that limits those indoor applications. Euclidean distance-based indexing techniques for outdoor moving objects [...] Read more.
With the emergence of various types of indoor positioning technologies (e.g., radio-frequency identification, Wi-Fi, and iBeacon), how to rapidly retrieve indoor cells and moving objects has become a key factor that limits those indoor applications. Euclidean distance-based indexing techniques for outdoor moving objects cannot be used in indoor spaces due to the existence of indoor obstructions (e.g., walls). In addition, currently, the indexing of indoor moving objects is mainly based on space-related query and less frequently on semantic query. To address these two issues, the present study proposes a multi-floor adjacency cell and semantic-based index (MACSI). By integrating the indoor cellular space with the semantic space, the MACSI subdivides open cells (e.g., hallways and lobbies) using space syntax and optimizes the adjacency distances between three-dimensionally connected cells (e.g., elevators and stairs) based on the caloric cost that extends single floor indoor space to three dimensional indoor space. Moreover, based on the needs of semantic query, this study also proposes a multi-granularity indoor semantic hierarchy tree and establishes semantic trajectories. Extensive simulation and real-data experiments show that—compared with the indoor trajectories delta tree (ITD-tree) and the semantic-based index (SI)—the MACSI produces more reliable query results with significantly higher semantic query and update efficiencies; has superior semantic expansion capability; and supports multi-granularity complex semantic queries. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue 3D Indoor Modelling and Navigation)
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2374 KiB  
Article
Field Motion Estimation with a Geosensor Network
by Daniel Fitzner and Monika Sester
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 175; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100175 - 27 Sep 2016
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 5252
Abstract
Physical environmental processes, such as the evolution of precipitation or the diffusion of chemical clouds in the atmosphere, can be approximated by numerical models based on the underlying physics, e.g., for the purpose of prediction. As the modeling process is often very complex [...] Read more.
Physical environmental processes, such as the evolution of precipitation or the diffusion of chemical clouds in the atmosphere, can be approximated by numerical models based on the underlying physics, e.g., for the purpose of prediction. As the modeling process is often very complex and resource demanding, such models are sometimes replaced by those that use historic and current data for calibration. For atmospheric (e.g., precipitation) or oceanographic (e.g., sea surface temperature) fields, the data-driven methods often concern the horizontal displacement driven by transport processes (called advection). These methods rely on flow fields estimated from images of the phenomenon by computer vision techniques, such as optical flow (OF). In this work, an algorithm is proposed for estimating the motion of spatio-temporal fields with the nodes of a geosensor network (GSN) deployed in situ when images are not available. The approach adapts a well-known raster-based OF algorithm to the specifics of GSNs, especially to the spatial irregularity of data. In this paper, the previously introduced approach has been further developed by introducing an error model that derives probabilistic error measures based on spatial node configuration. Further, a more generic motion model is provided, as well as comprehensive simulations that illustrate the performance of the algorithm in different conditions (fields, motion behaviors, node densities and deployments) for the two error measures of motion direction and motion speed. Finally, the algorithm is applied to data sampled from weather radar images, and the algorithm performance is compared to that of a state-of-the-art OF algorithm applied to the weather radar images directly, as often done in nowcasting. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Geosensor Networks and Sensor Web)
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4483 KiB  
Article
Normalized-Mutual-Information-Based Mining Method for Cascading Patterns
by Cunjin Xue, Jingyi Liu, Xiaohong Li and Qing Dong
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 174; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100174 - 27 Sep 2016
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 3994
Abstract
A cascading pattern is a sequential pattern characterized by an item following another item in order. Recent research has investigated a challenge of dealing with cascading patterns, namely, the exponential time dependence of database scanning with respect to the number of items involved. [...] Read more.
A cascading pattern is a sequential pattern characterized by an item following another item in order. Recent research has investigated a challenge of dealing with cascading patterns, namely, the exponential time dependence of database scanning with respect to the number of items involved. We propose a normalized-mutual-information-based mining method for cascading patterns (M3Cap) to address this challenge. M3Cap embeds mutual information to reduce database-scanning time. First, M3Cap calculates the asymmetrical mutual information between items with one database scan and extracts pair-wise related items according to a user-specified information threshold. Second, a one-level cascading pattern is generated by scanning the database once for each pair-wise related item at the quantitative level. Third, a recursive linking–pruning–generating loop generates an (m + 1)-level-candidate cascading pattern from m-dimensional patterns on the basis of antimonotonicity and non-additivity, repeating this step until no further candidate cascading patterns are generated. Fourth, meaningful cascading patterns are generated according to user-specified minimum evaluation indicators. Finally, experiments with remote sensing image datasets covering the Pacific Ocean demonstrate that the computation time of recursive linking and pruning is significantly less than that of database scanning; thus, M3Cap improves performance by reducing database scanning while increasing intensive computing. Full article
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2972 KiB  
Article
Automatic Scaling Hadoop in the Cloud for Efficient Process of Big Geospatial Data
by Zhenlong Li, Chaowei Yang, Kai Liu, Fei Hu and Baoxuan Jin
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 173; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100173 - 27 Sep 2016
Cited by 34 | Viewed by 7413
Abstract
Efficient processing of big geospatial data is crucial for tackling global and regional challenges such as climate change and natural disasters, but it is challenging not only due to the massive data volume but also due to the intrinsic complexity and high dimensions [...] Read more.
Efficient processing of big geospatial data is crucial for tackling global and regional challenges such as climate change and natural disasters, but it is challenging not only due to the massive data volume but also due to the intrinsic complexity and high dimensions of the geospatial datasets. While traditional computing infrastructure does not scale well with the rapidly increasing data volume, Hadoop has attracted increasing attention in geoscience communities for handling big geospatial data. Recently, many studies were carried out to investigate adopting Hadoop for processing big geospatial data, but how to adjust the computing resources to efficiently handle the dynamic geoprocessing workload was barely explored. To bridge this gap, we propose a novel framework to automatically scale the Hadoop cluster in the cloud environment to allocate the right amount of computing resources based on the dynamic geoprocessing workload. The framework and auto-scaling algorithms are introduced, and a prototype system was developed to demonstrate the feasibility and efficiency of the proposed scaling mechanism using Digital Elevation Model (DEM) interpolation as an example. Experimental results show that this auto-scaling framework could (1) significantly reduce the computing resource utilization (by 80% in our example) while delivering similar performance as a full-powered cluster; and (2) effectively handle the spike processing workload by automatically increasing the computing resources to ensure the processing is finished within an acceptable time. Such an auto-scaling approach provides a valuable reference to optimize the performance of geospatial applications to address data- and computational-intensity challenges in GIScience in a more cost-efficient manner. Full article
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4596 KiB  
Article
Dynamic Monitoring of Agricultural Fires in China from 2010 to 2014 Using MODIS and GlobeLand30 Data
by Huan Xie, Li Du, Sicong Liu, Lei Chen, Sa Gao, Shuang Liu, Haiyan Pan and Xiaohua Tong
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 172; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100172 - 25 Sep 2016
Cited by 22 | Viewed by 6067
Abstract
In the summer and autumn, which is the primary cropland planting preparation and harvest time, cropland burning is very common in China. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) Terra active fire product (MOD14) and GlobeLand30-2010 data are used here to analyze the fire [...] Read more.
In the summer and autumn, which is the primary cropland planting preparation and harvest time, cropland burning is very common in China. The Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) Terra active fire product (MOD14) and GlobeLand30-2010 data are used here to analyze the fire activity of the predominant land cover types. A total of 44,852 scenes of MOD14 images and MOD03 images are used, covering the whole of China from 20 May to 31 October during 2010 to 2014. Agricultural burning is a significant contributor to fire activity in China, and accounts for 60% on average of all the fire activity over the last five years. The spatial and temporal distribution of agricultural burning in seven different geographical regions is analyzed in detail. The experiments showed that the Central and Eastern China regions are the largest contributors to agricultural burning, producing 59%–80% of all the agricultural fires. At the national scale, the number of agricultural fire counts peak in June, which is associated primarily with winter burning of wheat croplands. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Analysis and Applications of Global Land Cover Data)
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5832 KiB  
Article
A Sensor Web and Web Service-Based Approach for Active Hydrological Disaster Monitoring
by Xi Zhai, Peng Yue and Mingda Zhang
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 171; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100171 - 24 Sep 2016
Cited by 12 | Viewed by 6357
Abstract
Rapid advancements in Earth-observing sensor systems have led to the generation of large amounts of remote sensing data that can be used for the dynamic monitoring and analysis of hydrological disasters. The management and analysis of these data could take advantage of distributed [...] Read more.
Rapid advancements in Earth-observing sensor systems have led to the generation of large amounts of remote sensing data that can be used for the dynamic monitoring and analysis of hydrological disasters. The management and analysis of these data could take advantage of distributed information infrastructure technologies such as Web service and Sensor Web technologies, which have shown great potential in facilitating the use of observed big data in an interoperable, flexible and on-demand way. However, it remains a challenge to achieve timely response to hydrological disaster events and to automate the geoprocessing of hydrological disaster observations. This article proposes a Sensor Web and Web service-based approach to support active hydrological disaster monitoring. This approach integrates an event-driven mechanism, Web services, and a Sensor Web and coordinates them using workflow technologies to facilitate the Web-based sharing and processing of hydrological hazard information. The design and implementation of hydrological Web services for conducting various hydrological analysis tasks on the Web using dynamically updating sensor observation data are presented. An application example is provided to demonstrate the benefits of the proposed approach over the traditional approach. The results confirm the effectiveness and practicality of the proposed approach in cases of hydrological disaster. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Geosensor Networks and Sensor Web)
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8405 KiB  
Article
Top-k Spatial Preference Queries in Directed Road Networks
by Muhammad Attique, Hyung-Ju Cho, Rize Jin and Tae-Sun Chung
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 170; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100170 - 23 Sep 2016
Cited by 9 | Viewed by 4789
Abstract
Top-k spatial preference queries rank objects based on the score of feature objects in their spatial neighborhood. Top-k preference queries are crucial for a wide range of location based services such as hotel browsing and apartment searching. In recent years, a [...] Read more.
Top-k spatial preference queries rank objects based on the score of feature objects in their spatial neighborhood. Top-k preference queries are crucial for a wide range of location based services such as hotel browsing and apartment searching. In recent years, a lot of research has been conducted on processing of top-k spatial preference queries in Euclidean space. While few algorithms study top-k preference queries in road networks, they all focus on undirected road networks. In this paper, we investigate the problem of processing the top-k spatial preference queries in directed road networks where each road segment has a particular orientation. Computation of data object scores requires examining the scores of each feature object in its spatial neighborhood. This may cause the computational delay, thus resulting in a high query processing time. In this paper, we address this problem by proposing a pruning and grouping of feature objects to reduce the number of feature objects. Furthermore, we present an efficient algorithm called TOPS that can process top-k spatial preference queries in directed road networks. Experimental results indicate that our algorithm significantly reduces the query processing time compared to period solution for a wide range of problem settings. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Location-Based Services)
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4668 KiB  
Article
A GIS Study of the Influences of Warm Ocean Eddies on the Intensity Variations of Tropical Cyclones in the South China Sea
by Feng Yang, Hui Peng, Yunyan Du and Guofeng Wu
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 169; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100169 - 23 Sep 2016
Cited by 3 | Viewed by 6813
Abstract
This study presented the spatial distribution patterns of tropical cyclones (TCs) in the South China Sea (SCS) and discussed the possible influences of average sea surface temperature (SST) and the size of warm ocean eddies on changes in the intensity of TCs passing [...] Read more.
This study presented the spatial distribution patterns of tropical cyclones (TCs) in the South China Sea (SCS) and discussed the possible influences of average sea surface temperature (SST) and the size of warm ocean eddies on changes in the intensity of TCs passing over them. Between 1993 and 2013, the SCS has experienced 233 TCs, of which 134 have interacted with warm ocean eddies. The results of fuzzy c-means (FCM) clustering showed that these TCs are mainly located in the northern portion of the SCS. After interacting with warm ocean eddies, TCs may intensify, remain at the same intensity, or weaken. For intensifying TCs, the enhancements range from 0 to 3 m/s only; however, this level of TC intensity enhancement is statistically significant at p<0.05. Further statistical analyses show that warm ocean eddies with a higher-than-average SST and a larger ratio between the size of the warm ocean eddies and the radius of the TC maximum wind may help intensify passing TCs. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Advances in Geo-Information for Environmental Forensics and Environmental Risk Management in the Anthropocene)
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3831 KiB  
Article
Visualizing the Intellectual Structure of Eye Movement Research in Cartography
by Shuang Wang, Yufen Chen, Yecheng Yuan, Haiyun Ye and Shulei Zheng
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 168; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100168 - 23 Sep 2016
Cited by 16 | Viewed by 5749
Abstract
Eye movement research is a burgeoning frontier area in cartography that has attracted much attention from cartographers. However, the substantial amount of relevant literature poses a challenge for researchers aiming to obtain a rapid understanding of the intellectual structure of this research field. [...] Read more.
Eye movement research is a burgeoning frontier area in cartography that has attracted much attention from cartographers. However, the substantial amount of relevant literature poses a challenge for researchers aiming to obtain a rapid understanding of the intellectual structure of this research field. The purpose of this paper is to introduce the use of bibliometric analysis methods and multiple visual metaphors to visualize the intellectual structure of eye movement research in cartography, including the classic literature, research theme clusters, and research hotspots, etc. We also explain the use of geovisualization method, which can efficiently represent the spatial distribution of scientific power. Although the analysis results may not fully describe the whole research field, this method is generally applicable. We hope that it will not only help researchers to quickly grasp the evolution and trends of this research field, but will also become a novel method of merging geovisualization with knowledge visualization. Full article
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5819 KiB  
Article
A Two-Step Clustering Approach to Extract Locations from Individual GPS Trajectory Data
by Zhongliang Fu, Zongshun Tian, Yanqing Xu and Changjian Qiao
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 166; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100166 - 23 Sep 2016
Cited by 60 | Viewed by 8297
Abstract
High-accuracy location identification is the basis of location awareness and location services. However, because of the influence of GPS signal loss, data drift and repeated access in the individual trajectory data, the efficiency and accuracy of existing algorithms have some deficiencies. Therefore, we [...] Read more.
High-accuracy location identification is the basis of location awareness and location services. However, because of the influence of GPS signal loss, data drift and repeated access in the individual trajectory data, the efficiency and accuracy of existing algorithms have some deficiencies. Therefore, we propose a two-step clustering approach to extract individuals’ locations according to their GPS trajectory data. Firstly, we defined three different types of stop points; secondly, we extracted these points from the trajectory data by using the spatio-temporal clustering algorithm based on time and distance. The experimental results show that the spatio-temporal clustering algorithm outperformed traditional extraction algorithms. It can avoid the problems caused by repeated access and can substantially reduce the effects of GPS signal loss and data drift. Finally, an improved clustering algorithm based on a fast search and identification of density peaks was applied to discover the trajectory locations. Compared to the existing algorithms, our method shows better performance and accuracy. Full article
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1867 KiB  
Article
Data Autodiscovery—The Role of the OPD
by Adrian J. M. Cox, Andrew J. Milsted and Christopher J. Gutteridge
ISPRS Int. J. Geo-Inf. 2016, 5(10), 167; https://doi.org/10.3390/ijgi5100167 - 22 Sep 2016
Viewed by 6549
Abstract
The importance of open data and the benefits it can offer have received recognition on the international stage with the signing of the G8 Open Data Charter in June 2013. The charter has an early focus on 14 high value areas, including transport [...] Read more.
The importance of open data and the benefits it can offer have received recognition on the international stage with the signing of the G8 Open Data Charter in June 2013. The charter has an early focus on 14 high value areas, including transport and education, where governments have greater influence. In the UK, we have seen the funding of the Open Data Institute (ODI) with a remit to support small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) in identifying benefits from using open data, whereas, within HE, open data discussion is in its infancy although is acknowledged as a sector challenge by the Russell Group of universities. There is an evident need for the academic community to influence the adoption of applications using linked open data techniques in data management and service delivery. This article introduces the concept of “data autodiscovery”, highlighting the role of the Organisation Profile Document (OPD) and its contribution to the early success of the UK National Equipment Portal, equipment.data, along with discussing the need for greater dialogue in linked and open data standards development. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Research Data Management)
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