Integrating Geospatial Technologies, Environmental Science, and Health Research

There is a huge potential for enhancing our understanding of and ability to prevent human disease through integrating the knowledge and methods in geography, environmental science, biomedical science, and public health. In this presentation, I discuss recent conceptual and methodological developments that help advance interdisciplinary research on the interaction between human health and the environment. Drawing upon my recent projects on individual exposures to green/blue spaces, light-at-night, and air and noise pollution, I explore how the collection, integration, and analysis of high-resolution space-time data enabled by advanced geospatial and mobile technologies (e.g., real-time mobile sensing and GPS tracking) can help identify the “truly relevant geographic context in space and time” and provide new insights into the relationships between human health, people’s daily mobility, and the complex spatiotemporal dynamics of environmental influences.