Related Experiment Video
Updated: Dec 8, 2025

Use of Principal Components for Scaling Up Topographic Models to Map Soil Redistribution and Soil Organic Carbon
Published on: October 16, 2018
Crop climate suitability mapping on the cloud: a geovisualization application for sustainable agriculture
Brad G Peter1, Joseph P Messina2, Zihan Lin3
1Department of Geography, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL, 35487, USA. bpeter@ua.edu.
Abstract:
Climate change, food security, and environmental sustainability are pressing issues faced by today's global population. As production demands increase and climate threatens crop productivity, agricultural research develops innovative technologies to meet these challenges. Strategies include biodiverse cropping arrangements, new crop introductions, and genetic modification of crop varieties that are resilient to climatic and environmental stressors. Geography in particular is equipped to address a critical question in this pursuit-when and where can crop system innovations be introduced? This manuscript presents a case study of the geographic scaling potential utilizing common bean, delivers an open access Google Earth Engine geovisualization application for mapping the fundamental climate niche of any crop, and discusses food security and legume biodiversity in Sub-Saharan Africa. The application is temporally agile, allowing variable growing season selections and the production of 'living maps' that are continually producible as new data become available. This is an essential communication tool for the future, as practitioners can evaluate the potential geographic range for newly-developed, experimental, and underrepresented crop varieties for facilitating sustainable and innovative agroecological solutions.
More Related Videos
Related Concept Videos
Levels of Use of a GIS
GIS Software, Hardware, and Sources of GIS Data
Applications of GIS: Disaster Management and Emergency Response
Introduction to GIS
Thematic Layering in GIS
What is Climate?

