New mapping techniques help scientific research

Das Spiegel and The Boston Globe : Although Google Earth wasn’t initially designed as a scientific tool, many scientists, such as Erik Born, a Danish biologist tracking walruses in the Artic Sea, are finding the program a cheap and effective way of visualizing their tracking data says Manfred Dworschak in Das Spiegel . The tool is also encouraging other GIS mapping software companies improve their software to compete with Google Earth .Meanwhile, Kim-Mai Cutler of the Boston Globe reports on SIGGRAPH 2006 , a major conference on computer graphics and emerging technologies that is drawing more than 25,000 people to Boston. The Woods Hole insitute is displaying at the conference a refined technique that will allow researchers to create a three-dimensional map of the ocean of vents, shipwrecks, and more easily map the migration patterns of whales. “Until we had good maps, you could have a city the size of Manhattan or Boston sitting on the bottom of the ocean and you’d be hard-pressed to find it,” says Dave Gallo, director of special projects at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution . These new techniques will let us, “see a Coke can on the ocean floor.” Das Spiegel The Boston Globe Google Earth Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution SIGGRAPH 2006