Geospatial intelligence (GEOINT) leverages geographic information science and technology (including cartography, geographic information systems, remote sensing, and global positioning systems) with intelligence tradecraft to develop intelligence products that support national security, disaster response, and international relief efforts. GEOG 882 is designed to challenge current and aspiring GEOINT professionals to be more than technicians. Students who successfully complete GEOG 882 will appreciate that while geospatial technologies are useful in revealing "what, who, where, and to some extent how" events are taking place, it is less useful in explaining "why" events occur, or what response is most appropriate. Students will learn that the political, cultural, historical, and economic perspectives of human geography are needed to put GEOINT analyses in context. The course will also challenge students to approach analyses critically, to consider alternative viewpoints and explanations, and to question their own assumptions.

GEOG 468 provides the geospatial information system professional an overview of systems analysis and design with emphasis the concepts behind the design process including: business use case modeling, business object modeling, requirements definition, analysis and preliminary design, and, finally, detailed design and deployment.

When we think of international affairs, we often think of the United Nations, foreign wars, and world trade summits. Though the geography of international affairs is certainly comprised of these and other such elements, each of these has a historical antecedent and a theoretical frame. In order to understand the realm of international affairs in its contemporary context, it is necessary to understand how we got here. One fundamental part of this is understanding how our global political system came to be and how contemporary systems are based on past iterations. The other fundamental part is to understand the theories that shaped these developments insofar as their influence on global political systems. In this course, we will examine the global political system as it is, as it was, and as it might be in the future.

Geography 431 is designed to further understanding of the natural processes of aquatic ecosystems, management of water resources, and threats to sustaining water quantity and quality – for all types of freshwater – surface, ground, rivers, lakes, wetlands … for geographers, ecologists, earth scientists, engineers, planners, other environmental professionals as well as those in non-science fields. This course will develop awareness and appreciation of the multiple perspectives about water as a precious resource, commodity, and sometimes hazard. We will learn how and why water is distributed unevenly in space and time around the Earth. We will examine the ways in which resource management decisions made in human society are strongly related to the availability, quantity, and quality of water. The course examines water resources management, including issues surrounding irrigation; dams and dam removal; provision of safe potable water; threats to water quantity and quality including human and aquatic ecosystem effects; land use changes; the water economy including bottled water, privatization, and water as a free good; water laws and policy; institutions for water management at the global, national, regional, and local scale; and issues of water security and climate change.

The course will train students to apply cost engineering methodology for geo-resources including minerals, oil, natural gas and coal. Students will apply present value, rate-of- return analysis, and cost engineering methodologies to evaluate engineering projects involving geo-resource exploration and production. Students will learn and are expected to be able to perform oil, natural gas, and mineral reserve estimations and evaluate production decline characteristics using geometric and geo-statistical methods. They will also learn about uncertainty and risk management as they apply to engineering project evaluations involving geo-resources. The course will be offered in fall and spring semesters and is intended for students with at least fifth-semester standing.

GEOG 594b is a seminar that brings together the threads of the Geospatial Intelligence program and reinforces the standards of professionalism applicable to geospatial intelligence analysis in government and business. The seminar's overarching aim is to enhance your understanding of the role of geospatial intelligence, develop individual competencies, reinforce professional concepts, and improve geospatial analytical techniques and methods.

The course provides the geospatial information system professional an overview of systems analysis and design with emphasis the concepts behind the design process including: business use case modeling, business object modeling, requirements definition, analysis and preliminary design, and, finally, detailed design and deployment. The concepts of the geospatial software and database development process are introduced and the limitations of current modeling techniques are addressed within the spatial systems development paradigm. In a series of related activities the student applies the methods, tools and the concepts of the systems development process to document a portion of a geospatial system with Unified Modeling Language (UML), the standard graphical notation for modeling application needs. UML affords a common unifying framework that integrates database models with the rest of a system design.

METEO 003 will introduce to you a wide variety of basic atmospheric concepts so that you can become a better "weather consumer" (better understand and evaluate weather information) and gain a better understanding of "how the weather works." You will learn about Weather Analysis Tools, The Global Heat Budget, The Global and Local Controllers of Temperature, The Role of Water in the Atmosphere, Remote Sensing of the Atmosphere, Surface Patters of Pressure and Wind, Mid-Latitude Weather Systems, Stability and Thunderstorms, Severe Weather, The Human Impact of Weather and Climate, Patterns of Wind, Water, and Weather in the Tropics, and Hurricanes.

This course is a friendly introduction to Geographic Information Science and related Technologies, reflecting current state-of-the-art and practice. GIScience is the intersection of professions, institutions, and technologies that produce geographic data and render information from it. It is a rapidly growing and evolving field. Learning is a way of life for everyone who is successful in today’s every changing world. With this in mind, we hope that this text may contribute to your lifelong exploration of how geographic information and related technologies that generate it can be used to improve the quality of life--yours and your neighbors', locally and globally, now and in the future.

This course brings together core concepts in cartography, geographic information systems, and spatial thinking with real-world examples to provide the fundamentals necessary to engage with Geography beyond the surface-level. We will explore what makes spatial information special, how spatial data is created, how spatial analysis is conducted, and how to design maps so that they’re effective at telling the stories we wish to share. To gain experience using this knowledge, we will work with the latest mapping and analysis software to explore geographic problems.

This course takes students on a historical, scientific, and cultural exploration through the world of materials — from the cosmos to the atom, from Asimov to Pauling, from ancient Mesopotamia to modern day Pennsylvania, and from early man’s primitive stone tools to the complex materials that help us build, communicate, travel, work and live in the 21st century.

This course involves the design, development, and deployment of interactive mapping tools distributed via the World Wide Web and using “open” (non-proprietary, community-developed) standards and software code. It will also prepare students to design, develop, and implement custom web mapping applications using open standards and open source software. On completion of the course, students will be able to build and deploy a complete web mapping solution including selecting the spatial data, the server and client software. Students will be able to determine which type of mapping server is required for their needs and to explain why choosing an open standard based solution is better than a proprietary solution. The course will cover a variety of open source software packages for web mapping and will provide pointers to commercial solutions where appropriate.

Our Open Web Mapping course (GEOG 585) teaches students how to publish geographic data and maps through the use of open-source web mapping standards and software. Such a solution is best suited for situations that involve the sharing of large datasets (particularly those with line or polygon geometry) or that require a relatively advanced interface. This course teaches how to build mapping applications using two APIs (specifically, the Google Maps API and Esri's JavaScript API). Such applications are often referred to as mashups, because they bring together data from multiple sources to produce a new product. The advantages of building a map application via this route are that background layers are provided by the company who wrote the API and that the learning curve for using the APIs is less steep than learning how to build comparable applications with open web mapping software. By the end of this course, you will be able to build a fairly sophisticated mapping application that would require a lot more effort and cost to replicate through other means.

In this course you will learn about phase relations as applied to oil and/or gas reservoir processes, enhanced oil recovery, gas pipeline transportation, natural gas processing and liquefaction, and other problems in petroleum production. The primary objective of the course is to apply the thermodynamics of phase equilibrium to the framework for phase behavior modeling of petroleum fluids. The focus of the course will be on equilibrium thermodynamics and its relevance to phase behavior predictions and phase equilibrium data description. We will attempt to apply phase behavior principles to petroleum production processes of practical interest, especially natural gas condensate systems.

This course introduces the potential of GIS to support all stages of emergency (crisis or disaster) management activities, the latest R&D advances that are helping to achieve this potential now, and some challenges for the future. The course focuses on requirements analysis and proposal writing targeted toward planning and implementing GIS solutions for government agencies and contractors. As a basis from which to pursue these objectives, Planning GIS for Emergency Management introduces the current and potential future roles of GIS in support of crisis (emergency) management activities at all geographic scales (local to international). These roles are considered at each of the four stages of crisis management are (mitigation, preparation, response, and recovery). Then, selected focus topics (e.g., GIS for evacuation planning and support) are considered in detail.

This course covers a mix of fundamental topics in solid Earth science such as plate tectonic theory as well as current research being conducted here at Penn State.

Students learn to use the Visual Basic for Applications (VBA) programming environment to add functionality to ArcView. No previous programming experience is assumed. Students who successfully complete the course are able to automate repetitive tasks, customize the ArcView interface, and share their customizations with others.

This course targets students from various disciplines that work with chemical and physical processes in natural subsurface. This includes, for example, petroleum and natural gas engineering, geosciences, environmental engineering, agricultural engineering, civil engineering, chemical engineering, and applied mathematics. The course teaches fundamental concepts that are important in understanding subsurface reactive transport processes, as well as their quantitative representation and application. Covered topics include, for example, (bio)geochemical thermodynamics and kinetics, contaminant transport, and reactive transport coupling. Depending on the students’ interests, the course will discuss the applications of the principles in understanding and quantifying chemical weathering processes, environmental (bio)remediation, geological carbon sequestration, and reservoir souring.

This course will introduce you to Remote Sensing for the Geospatial Intelligence Professional - Students who successfully complete GEOG 883 will have a basic understanding of remote sensing systems, airborne and space borne sensors that collect optical imagery, elevation, and spectral data. They will understand the methods used to georeference and rectify these data in order to produce scaled maps and GIS-ready digital data products. The students will be introduced to the processing workflows used to convert raw data into orthophotos, digital terrain models, and image analysis products. These data products will be used in a variety of application scenarios, using commercially available software tools.