05/26/2015
In partnership with the School of Global Policy and Strategy, Calit2's Big Pixel Initiative held its first hackathon over the weekend. A total of 35 students made use of high-resolution satellite imagery from DigitGlobe in an attempt to ask -- and answer -- a series of questions, such as how to measure the growth of urban slums in poor countries, how to measure the impact of natural disasters on water quality in cities and how to identify illegal fishing in the Caribbean.
This event, held May 23 at the Qualcomm Institute Black Box Theater, drew a total of 35 students separated into teams of five. Such groups defined a question and how they would use satellite imagery—made available to the Center on Global Transformation and the Qualcomm Institute via a new partnership with DigitGlobe—to answer the question. The result: Teams tackled how to measure the growth of urban slums in poor countries, how to measure the impact of natural disasters on water quality in cities and how to identify illegal fishing in the Caribbean, among other things.