Forecasting Urbanization

Typography

University of Delaware data scientist Jing Gao is fascinated by the ways that cities and towns grow over time. 

University of Delaware data scientist Jing Gao is fascinated by the ways that cities and towns grow over time. This concept is known as urbanization.

Take Chicago, Los Angeles and New York. All of these are cities, but they each grow differently, in terms of how the city’s land areas expand. The same is true globally, from New Delhi, India, to Paris, France.

Gao, an assistant professor of geography and spatial sciences in UD’s College of Earth, Ocean and Environment, and collaborator Brian O’Neill, a UD alumnus and professor from the University of Denver, have created a new global simulation model to predict how urban land will change over the next 100 years under different social and economic conditions.

The research leverages data science and machine learning to provide a first long-term look at how urbanization will unfold — decade by decade.

Read more at University of Delaware

Image: University of Delaware data scientist Jing Gao and collaborator Brian O'Neill from the University of Denver have created a new global simulation model to predict how urban land will change over the next 100 years under different social and economic conditions. (Credit: Photo by Jeffrey C. Chase)