Daniel Goldberg, a GIS lab researcher and Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Computer Science at USC, has been selected as one of five finalists in the AAG GIS Specialty Group 2007 Honors Competition for Student Papers on GIS. Dan will present his paper entitled “A Mediator-Based Method for Iterative Gazetteer Generation”, detailing the development of advanced methods for generating highly complete and accurate gazetteers, at a special session of the AAG Annual Meeting in April, 2007 in San Francisco.

New USC study takes a close look at region’s parks, sees inequity in a land of plenty. Despite the fact that greater Los Angeles has some exceptional parks and open spaces, many southland residents do not have easy access to recreational green space, according to a new Green Visions Plan (GVP) study. The report is the first study to comprehensively assess parks and recreational open space assets in the Los Angeles region.

Jingfen Sheng, a lab researcher and Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Geography at USC, will present at the First International Symposium on Terrain Analysis and Digital Terrain Modelling in Nanjing, China from 23-25 November 2006. Her paper will discuss the results from (1) investigating the effectiveness of terrain analysis models on flood prediction under different land surface characteristics and (2) examining the sensitivity of spatio-temporal flood predictions to catchment wetness.

Daniel Goldberg has been selected by North American Association of Central Cancer Registries to write their "Geocoding Best Practices Guide" as part of their Technical Assistance for Cancer Surveillance program funded by the National Cancer Institute. This work will be used by all state cancer registries in the US and Canada to guide their geocoding efforts. Their previous handbook "Using Geographic Information Systems Technology in the Collection, Analysis, and Presentation of Cancer Registry Data: A Handbook of Basic Practices" is a highly cited reference throughout the health research community.