Learn about how Janine Pollack, an Environmental Engineer, got her start at NASA and the kinds of work she does as an engineer.
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Botanists research plant characteristics like their physiological processes, their evolutionary history, resistance to disease, relationships to other parts of the Biosphere or sphere within the Earth System. Many botanists work in different locations; some may work indoors in laboratories and offices conducting experiments while others may work in agriculture and spend much of their time outdoors. Some botanists may also discover new plant species and share their learning with the public through tours and events.
A geotechnical engineer is a type of civil engineer who focuses on the mechanics of the land, rocks, and soils in the building process. This type of engineering includes, but is not limited to, analyzing, designing, and constructing foundations, retaining structures, slopes, embankments, roadways, tunnels, levees, wharves, landfills, and other systems that are comprised of rock or soil.
Soil Conservation Technicians collect and manage survey data for conservation, develop a plan to implement conservation actions, and supervise fieldwork. Their work starts with developing physical resource plans and documents on the history of the land. Technicians survey, layout, and section off the site. They assist the landowner in selecting, installing, and maintaining a variety of measures that conserve and improve the soil, plant, water, marsh, wildlife and recreational resources of the land.
Geospatial Information Scientists and Technologists research geospatial data or develop geospatial technologies. Geospatial data is data that has a geographic component associated with it, such as coordinates or an address, and geospatial technologies are the technologies used to collect and analyze geospatial data.
An environmental planner tries to minimize the environmental impacts of housing, industrial, and transportation-related construction projects. Environmental planners help project managers navigate the environmental permitting process where they review a site to investigate potential environmental effects. This includes the effects of natural disasters.
Explore using units in calculations with the Leaf Area Index (LAI). LAI is a ratio that describes the number of square meters of leaves per square meter of available land surface. Because of the units in the ratio, it is dimensionless.
Explore using units for calculations with Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI). NDVI is a ratio of different light wavelength reflectance which can be used to map the density of green vegetation.
Dr. Eric Brown de Colstoun is a Physical Scientist in the Biospheric Sciences Laboratory, NASA/GSFC, where he has been working for over 15 years. His expertise in the field of remote sensing is broad, having used data collected at various spatial scales, with a variety of instrumentation (laboratory, field, airborne, satellite).
The fires in Greece during the summer of 2007 devastated large tracks of forest and ground cover in this Mediterranean region. Students analyze these data to determine the scale, area, and percentage of the forest impacted by of these fires.