Instrumentation for a G.I.S. Laboratory to Enhance Undergraduate Education

一个地理信息系统实验室正在发展，以展示大空间尺度上的生态原理和过程，并促进本科生的跨学科研究。GIS技术为用户提供了输入、编辑、覆盖、分析和显示具有空间成分的任何信息的手段（例如，溪流、道路、植被覆盖类型、动物运动和位置、海拔）。因此，GIS是研究空间格局和空间关系的有力工具。新实验室补充了环境生物学现有的实验室和实地研究，但提供了研究景观和区域环境对当地生物群落和功能的影响的技术。实验室配备了8台奔腾电脑工作站、数字化平板电脑、扫描仪、彩色打印机、数字化数据集和必要的软件包。多个工作站为高年级生态学和自然资源管理课程的学生以及测试景观生态学假设的学生研究团队提供了访问GIS技术的途径。该实验室亦正装设移动全球定位系统接收器和天线，让学生能准确记录和储存研究地块和边界的位置，以便日后输入地理信息系统。

A Geographic Information System (GIS) laboratory is being developed to demonstrate ecological principles and processes on large spatial scales and promote interdisciplinary research by undergraduate students. GIS technology provides the means for users to input, edit, overlay, analyze, and display any information that has a spatial component (e.g., streams, roads, vegetative cover types, animal movements and locations, elevations). As such, GIS is a powerful tool for studying spatial patterns and relationships. The new laboratory complements existing laboratory and field studies in environmental biology, but provides the technology to investigate the influence of landscape and regional environments on local biotic communities and functions. The laboratory is being equipped with eight Pentium-PC workstations, digitizing tablets, scanner, color printer, digitized data sets, and requisite software packages. Multiple workstations provide access to GIS technology for students enrolled in upper-division ecology and natural resources management classes and for student research teams testing hypotheses in landscape ecology. The laboratory is also being equipped with a mobile Global Positioning System receiver and antenna, so that students can accurately record and store the locations of study plots and boundaries for subsequent entry into the GIS system.