Highlights for February 5, 1998
USGS Center for Biological Informatics

I. Key Department News:

• USGS-NASA Paper Presented at JPL Workshop: On January 12, a paper coauthored by James Getter (OBIO) and Diane Wickland (NASA, Office of Earth Science) titled "DOI Use of AVIRIS Data In Natural Resources Management - A Technology Transfer Project: Status Report" was presented to approximately 150 Federal, State, and university scientists at the Seventh Annual Jet Propulsion Laboratory Earth Science Workshop in Pasadena, California. AVIRIS is an acronym for the Airborne Visible InfraRed Imaging Spectrometer, a unique optical sensor that flies aboard a NASA ER-2 airplane (a U2 plane modified for increased performance) at approximately 20 km above sea level, at about 730 km/hr. AVIRIS has flown all across the United States, plus Canada and Europe. The science objectives of the AVIRIS project are broad. The main objective is to identify, measure, and monitor constituents of the Earth's surface and atmosphere based on molecular absorption and particle scattering signatures. Research with AVIRIS is dominantly directed toward understanding processes related to the global environment and climate change. The USGS is providing DOI leadership in a partnership with NASA's Mission to Planet Earth Program to provide technology transfer to DOI technical managers for natural resources applications. (James Getter, Reston, 703-648-4206)

• USGS Participates in State-Federal Cooperative Mapping Project: On January 27, Tom Owens (CBI) participated in a cooperative Colorado Division of Wildlife-BLM project to map Colorado's vegetation using Landsat imagery. The Colorado Vegetation Mapping Project, now in its third year, is scheduled to complete mapping of the state by 2001. Owens gave Federal Geographic Data Committee perspectives on the classification system, proposed metadata, and the Spatial Data Transfer Standard (SDTS). The SDTS provides a method of transferring Earth-referenced spatial data between dissimilar computer systems with the potential for no information loss. It is a transfer standard that embraces the philosophy of self-contained transfers; i.e., spatial data, attributes, georeferencing information, data quality reports, data dictionaries, and other supporting metadata are all included in the transfer. The USGS has taken the lead in converting its digital cartographic data holdings to SDTS format. Owens will provide assistance in crosswalking the project's classification system with the National Vegetation Classification Standard. (Tom Owens, Denver, 303-202-4259).

• USGS Assists Smithsonian Research on Metadata Standards: On February 4, Susan Stitt (CBI) provided Neal Kobayashi of the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC) in Edgewater, Maryland, with information regarding the National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII) Metadata Standard. The SERC is currently reviewing various metadata standards for ecological data. BRD has released a version of the NBII Metadata Standard for review and testing, generated from a digital version of the Federal Geographic Data Committee's Content Standards for Digital Geospatial Metadata. (Susan Stitt, Denver, 303-202-4234)

• Biological Profile Standard Development: On February 4, Susan Stitt (CBI) gave a presentation to the Federal Geospatial Data Committee (FGDC) Biological Data Working Group on the development of a biological profile for the FGDC's Content Standards for Digital Geospatial Metadata. She also reviewed USGS/BRD activities to date and described the current status of the Content Standard for National Biological Information Infrastructure Metadata. A biological profile will increase the FGDC's Content Standard's utility for documenting biological resources data and information, thus supporting increased access to and use of biological data on a national and international basis. (Susan Stitt, Denver, 303-202-4234)

IV. Press/Media Inquiries: No report.