FST Graduate Research Topic

Research Topic: Ecosystem modeling and data analytics (Software upgrade in Visual Studio C++ )
Suggested By: Larbi Esmahi
Last Update: December 1st, 2017

Water and land are economically and ecologically significant for the development and sustainability of Alberta and west Canada communities. Modern modelling tools can provide supports of decision-making and agricultural and land use management. Therefore, agro-ecosystem modelling is an important topic for agricultural production, agricultural management, resources management and greenhouse gas emissions (GHGs). We have developed the software of agro-ecosystem modelling based on old VC complier. The aim of this project is to upgrade agro-ecosystem modelling software from Visual C++6 to Visual C++9 (Visual Studio 2008). The upgraded modelling framework using Visual Studio 2008 can be used for water, crops, soils, and agro-ecosystem management, and other of interest, such as reclamation and remediation of oil and gas sites. The upgraded model will be tested against the field data. This will help analyze and assess the combined environmental effects from agricultural activities using modelling and data analytic techniques and inform the future well-being and sustainability, thereby providing a new tool to help design more informative monitoring systems and experiments, assess cumulative effects of non-point source pollution and inform agricultural and reclamation and remediation decision. This research topic is suitable for Project, Thesis, and Essay route students. The ideal candidate has a good experience of Visual Studio C++ in software development with some system modelling. This research will be conducted with the collaboration of Prof Junye Wang and Dr. Larbi Esmahi. The student will be a member of the CAIP Research Chair team in Computational Sustainability and Environmental Analytics at Athabasca University. We will provide some research assistantship for potential peer-review publications under our team support. How to apply for the position, send an email to Prof Junye Wang at junyew@athabascau.ca or Dr. Larbi Esmahi with a detailed CV.