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Week 3: Vector Spatial Analysis

Core Questions

  • How can vector operations answer ecological and conservation questions?
  • Which observations fall inside protected areas, watersheds, or habitat polygons?
  • How do buffers, intersections, and spatial joins change the unit of analysis?

Concepts

  • Spatial joins.
  • Intersection, union, and difference.
  • Buffers.
  • Nearest-neighbor operations.
  • Point-in-polygon analysis.
  • Distance matrices.

Python Tools

  • GeoPandas.
  • Shapely.

Applied Lab

Using species observations, protected areas, watersheds, roads, and habitat polygons, students ask which observations occur inside protected areas, how many species occur within 500 m of a road, and which sampling locations fall within each watershed.

Deliverable

Submit a vector spatial analysis report with maps, code, and short interpretations for at least three spatial questions.