We are pleased to invite the campus community and colleagues to Wayne State University’s Integrative Environmental Health Sciences Seminar Series. The series is hosted by Wayne State’s CURES P30ES036084 Environmental Health Sciences Core Center and the CLEAR P42 Superfund Research Program.

Our next seminar will be held on March 20, 2025 from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m. EST via Zoom. Zoom details will be emailed to all registrants.

The guest speakers will be Dr. Erin Bunting, assistant professor in the Department of Geography, Environment, and Spatial Sciences at Michigan State University, and Robert Goodwin, the senior geospatial analyst and associate director for Remote Sensing (RS) and Geographic Information Systems (GIS) at Michigan State University. They will present, "MIDAS: Harnessing the Power of Geospatial Data in a Collaborative Environment."

Abstract:

MIDAS (Multifactorial Integrative Design Analytic System) is a GIS-based collaborative platform developed under the CURES grant and housed at Michigan State University. Designed as part of the translational research support core, MIDAS enables researchers to securely store, analyze, and visualize geospatial data in an enterprise GIS environment, supporting interdisciplinary collaboration across institutions. This presentation highlights how MIDAS facilitates data sharing, advanced spatial analysis, and project management, making it a powerful tool for environmental and health research. A case study on brownfield sites and birth outcomes in Detroit, conducted with Henry Ford Health and Wayne State University (CLEAR initiative), demonstrates its impact. By integrating environmental and health datasets, MIDAS helped identify spatial overlaps in exposure and adverse birth outcomes, providing valuable insights for public health and policy decisions. MIDAS serves as a model for scalable, collaborative geospatial research, supporting CURES-affiliated researchers in tackling complex urban health and environmental challenges.

Biographies:

Erin Bunting is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Geography, Environment, and Spatial Sciences at Michigan State University. She specializes in remote sensing, GIS, and spatial analysis, with a focus on time series applications, climate impacts, and land use/land cover change. Dr. Bunting has extensive experience in big data remote sensing, GeoAI, and drone-based data collection, and previously served as Director of RS&GIS at MSU. Her research, which has taken place around the world, integrates cutting-edge geospatial technologies to address environmental and societal challenges including armed conflict, water insecurity, invasive species mapping, and land conservation / policy implications.

Robert Goodwin is the Senior Geospatial Analyst and Associate Director at RS&GIS. Robert began his career as a wildlife biologist and forester for the United States Forest Service after graduating from Michigan State University in 1994. He returned to MSU in 1996 to study geographic information science (GIS) and remote sensing and immediately began working for RS&GIS. Robert has been working as a geospatial analyst since 1998 and specializes in geospatial data development, modeling, database management, field data collection, geospatial web content authoring, drone data collection, and image processing and analysis. He is the lead trainer at RS&GIS, the manager of the unit’s uncrewed aerial system (UAS) program, and serves on the State of Michigan GIS Advisory Group and the Michigan State University User Group leadership committee.