GIS

PointFuse launches ‘PointFuse Pro’

PointFuse software which enables the fast, easy creation of intelligent mesh models of any environment from point cloud data has extended its product portfolio in tandem with the latest release going live, version 2020.02. Available immediately following research with current customers, a new version of the software has been created called PointFuse Pro. Users can now choose between PointFuse Standard, and PointFuse Pro. www.pointfuse.com

Blue Marble Geographics’ Geographic Calculator 2020 SP1

Blue Marble Geographics® has announced the release of Geographic Calculator 2020 SP1 — the leading geodetic software for coordinate conversion and datum transformation. It introduces many new features and improvements, including new IOGP data model types for Usage and Scope Objects, Dynamic Datums, and Ensembles. bluemarblegeo.com

LiDAR Survey for Delhi-Varanasi High Speed Rail Corridor

National High Speed Rail Corporation Limited will be adopting Light Detection and Ranging Survey (LiDAR) technique using Laser enabled equipment mounted on a Helicopter for conducting ground survey for the preparation of Detailed Project Report for the proposed Delhi- Varanasi HSR corridor. This technique uses a combination of Laser data, GPS data, flight parameters and actual photographs to give accurate survey data. Based on the findings of the survey, designing of the vertical & horizontal alignment, structures, location of the stations and depots, Land requirement for the corridor, identification of project affected plots/ structures, Right of Way etc are decided. The aerial LiDAR survey technique, for the first time for any railway project in India, was adopted for the Mumbai- Ahmedabad High Speed Rail Corridor primarily because of its high accuracy. The ground survey using aerial LiDAR for MAHSR alignment was done only in 12 weeks against the 10-12 months if had been done through traditional survey methods. https://pib.gov.in

Ministry of Science and Technology, India invites proposals under National Geospatial Programme

Department of Science and Technology, in collaboration with the Accelerating Growth of New India’s innovations (AGNIi) initiative of Office of the Principal Scientific Adviser to the Government of India under the Prime Minister’s Science, Technology, and Innovation Advisory Council PSA office has invited short-term proposals from Geospatial start-ups and knowledge institutions of the country, with the aim of critically strengthening the nation’s innovation ecosystem.

Financial support will be provided to selected organizations, focusing on area specific spatial analytics (including techniques/demonstration etc.) in the sectors of migration, employment generation (specially in agriculture and construction), strengthening of livelihood, resource mapping for community resilience, etc.

The details are as follows:

A. Migration

• Urban and regional mobilities: dwell times and movements to assess the situation and identify trends.

• Convergence, migration, and dispersal of population and migrant workers.

• Digital supply chain maps and analysis.

B. Strengthening Livelihood and Employment Generation

• Mapping and geo-analysis of reverse migrants for assessment of livelihood creation within village/district/state

• Geospatial analytics for Skilling/ reskilling of migrants

• Resource mapping for community resilience

• Site Suitability Analysis for livelihood creation and survival.

• Resource locator in a cluster for skill development trainings, as well as Geocultural indicators for livelihood.

• Modelling mitigating the situation for economic sectors such as industry, commerce, transport, and agriculture, based on satellite data.

• Modelling import substitution in tier 2/tier 3 cities, aligning with the need of rural catchment area

• Modelling urban unemployment in service sector and solution therein

C. Others

• Development of open source village level Geospatial information platform for villagers, school teachers, students

• Modelling/assessing forecast of potential Spread of COVID-19 beyond the lockdown and mitigation (citycentric infection percolation model)

• Predictive risk of each district for COVID-19 through sewage disposals and environment predictors

• Deep Reinforcement Learning model using COVID 19 databases to assist in optimal response in a dynamically varying scenario

• Social vulnerability mapping and analysis of COVID-19 impacts for initiating economic activities

• Dependency modelling of healthcare infrastructure with interrelated infrastructures, such as transportation, water supply, pharmacy/equipment, food supply etc

• Knowledge representation approaches (e.g. Ontologies) of the causal relationships between disease and geographical settings to enable reasoning for automated decision-making

• Geospatial analytics, based upon AI/ ML, for future disaster preparedness

NextNav introduces Unity Plug-In

NextNav has announced the release of a Unity plug-in for its vertical positioning service, Pinnacle, which delivers precise altitude data to unlock 3D experiences for geolocation applications. Its Unity plug-in makes it easy for developers to integrate vertical location into any application built with the Unity engine, including games, training applications, industrial and manufacturing apps and beyond.