Tiny Gyroscope

Chris Hadfield's twitter page tipped me off to this - a science daily article on a new optical gyroscope, smaller than a grain of rice. Its one of the first high performance ones shrunk down to a size that is suitable for portable devices. I've nothing really to add to it but worth a blog post on its own I think!

Geo for Good

One of my research goals is to start identifying opportunities for satellite, GIS, data science to help with humanitarian or environmental issues. Examples like Satellite Sentinel, Global Fisheries Watch, the stuff I posted on the flooded island the Rohingya were being moved to, or the BBC Africa use of spatial and social data to track down three war criminals have got me thinking.

I came across a great example in National Geographic recently Surveyors visiting remote tribes and helping them to define and demarcate their land and resources using maps - security of tenure and all that - one I remember from Land Management modules at undergrad. This is going to be even more important in a future of reduced resources and climate hazards.

Ship Collision Spotted in Sentinel 2 Imagery

This is a great catch - hat tip to Fernin Avila on twitter for spotting a ship collision on the Sentinel hub EO browser (does he mean sentinel playground?). Must try and find out more about it - when where, damn the torpedoes etc - maybe AIS has some replay functionality in the free versions? I don't think so - but still, very interesting.

National Space Strategy

Summer is never a good time to elicit responses for an important consultation but nevertheless there was a call for comments on the Space Strategy for Ireland in July/August. As part of the SCSI Working Group in Earth Observation and Remote Sensing, I worked with a few other members to highlight some of the concerns we had in relation to spatial data, applications, industry potential, outreach and skills gaps. I was not surprised to see that at the follow up meet most, if not all companies had the same concerns. The downstream sector was definitely in the majority - but I got the impression that the concerns of the upstream got the better airing as the morning wore on. One thing that surprised me - I had always heard anecdotally that the upstream was doing better than down, but this seems not to be the case. 

DBEI organised and was hosted by DFF&T at the beautiful Iveagh House. Like the Korec seminars in Carton House - you spend more time gazing at the ceiling than the speaker.

Some general observations, although I'm sure this will be formally published in the near future. 

• Siloed interests abound - many people unaware of what supports and who is out there for potential collaboration.
• Lack of coordination at national level - talk of a 'space coordinating centre' was judged overkill but a single space officer to combine ESA, Copernicus and other EU info was universally agreed as important. There was an extra €500k in the budget alotted for ESA work this year, it may feed into it?
• Skills shortage - particularly at undergrad level - on both EO side and also at the engineering side on materials - i.e. space tech manufacture or RS are only single modules, rather than a full programme. Seems to be demand in the industry for those graduates - SAR skillset an EU wide shortage.
• Currently there is an overdependance on ESA for contracts - NASA, UN, H2020 other world orgs should be considered.
• Lack of a big space industry in Ireland is hampering growth - some discussion on trying to coax a large space player to Ireland, but would have to avoid hampering native industry who are currently growing.

Hopefully will lead somewhere.

MSc in GIS and RS - SCSI Accreditation Event

It is great to be able to announce that the Maynooth University Department of Geography MSc in GIS and Remote Sensing is now formally accredited by the Society of Chartered Surveyors Ireland (SCSI) and the Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS). We had the event yesterday in Rocque lab and even the beautiful old maps by the entrance got an airing. That pic is taken beside the Manor of Maynooth survey by John Rocque in 1750 approx.

Accreditation opens alot of doors to students who go on to pursue it upon graduation and it have even backdated eligibility for the last three years of the MSc graduates so hopefully they will start down that route too. As for me my original motive was to get more juicy brains for the RS and EO working group but now I am back here teaching that changes my outlook somewhat!

Thanks to Colin Bray (CEO OSi and immediate past president of the SCSI) and Prof Maria Pramaggiore (Dean Graduate Studies) for coming along to speak at the event. A special thanks to James Lonergan from the SCSI for all his help in getting this over the line - his input really made a difference and delighted that he is in SCSI HQ helping us with going forward.

Out-suited again, I never seem to get that one right.

AR Sandbox

My dream of getting my hands on an AR sandbox become a bit less fantastic this week. I had decided by hook or by crook that I would get the hardware and start making one - some great online guides, even AutoDESK have one up there - but I was alerted via twitter of one that was already in Maynooth! The CS department 'Makers Club' had built one with some French interns a few years back. I will get my begging bowl out and see if they might let us borrow it for Geography Week which is coming up soon. If it is a hit we might look at making our own, we have most of the hardware except the Kinect sensor.

Drones and Motorway Mapping

I see Korec have won a contract with Transport Infrastructure Ireland to provide 2 drones and also map the motorways. The statistic that one drone can cover as much ground in an hour flight as a survey team does in 14 days is very impressive, although I wonder is that an area based measurement - whereas a road is a route corridor? Drones are limited by LOS still, and basic restrictions are 300m. Unless the operator will drive along underneath? Interesting all the same. Having worked on QBN surveys back in the boom I think the most survey points I captured in one day was around 2200 - and that was a busy busy day, so not hard to see how drones will speed things up, if not get the same level of accuracy. 

Poor Mobile Mapping Systems - they were just too expensive to catch on over here, drones are a fraction of the cost. I know Korec haver access to one of the Trimble ones - they brought it in for the IEOS in 2014.