Down To Earth: A podcast for Geoscientists by Geoscientist

S4E07 Down to Earth: Artificial Intelligence: Boon or Bane for Open Science?

There’s a technological revolution happening right now that is having a massive impact on our interactions with each other, and the world around us. That revolution? Artificial Intelligence. Touted as a tool that will enable the average individual to generate groundbreaking developments for the betterment of humanity, AI is being seen as a panacea for many of our challenges in healthcare, education, agriculture, and transport. But as the saying goes, “With great power comes great responsibility”. What are the ethical implications of AI and what are we doing to address these? Further, how does AI fit into the Open Science movement? In this episode, we chat with Dr. Sasha Luccioni, Research Scientist, Hugging Face an organization focused on democratizing AI through open methods, to get some answers.

S4E06 Down to Earth: Breaking Barriers with Open Education and Open Peer Review

It’s all well and good to have open source software, but if end-users have no clue how to operate it, open data becomes useless. That’s why Open Education is another important component of open science. In this episode, we speak with Dr. Leah Wasser, Executive Director of pyOpenSci, who developed a publicly accessible curriculum to teach python and R to anyone who wants to learn!

S4E05 Down to Earth: Making Open Source more Accessible: A GitHub Case Study

How can we ensure open source is open to everyone? In this episode we speak to Demetris Cheatham, Senior Director of Diversity, Inclusion & Belonging at GitHub, about how she’s building “open opportunities” and equity into a diversity, inclusion, and belonging strategy to ensure GitHub’s infrastructure is just.

S4E04 Down to Earth: Pirate or Proprietary? The Solution in Open Source

Open science and open data easily go hand-in-hand, but one area of open science that’s often forgotten is open source. What is open source and how does it allow us to actually use open data? In this episode, we speak to Yuvi Panda, Co-Founder of 2i2C – a nonprofit devoted to developing, operating, and supporting infrastructure for interactive computing – about how we can make tools work for the open science movement.

S4E03 Down to Earth: Navigating Data Sovereignty in Open Science

Every day 2.5 quintillion bytes of data is being created. This is an unfathomable number, but the reality is, we are constantly generating data with every app we use on or phone, every purchase we make, even every time we see a doctor. As the creators of data, what rights do we have to governing it? And with the push to make data more open, how we can ensure our science continues to uphold the values of ethics, justice, and equity? In this episode, we speak to Sativa Cruz, Applied Scientist at the Bay Area Environmental Reseach Institute at NASA Ames Research Center and member of the NASA Indigenous Peoples Initiative, to explore the data sovereignty considerations that must be addressed when embracing open science.

S4E02 Down to Earth: Dealing with Data: Infrastructures and Standards

Data is EVERYWHERE. In fact, there’s so much of it, we now have the term “Big Data” to describe the increased volume and velocity at which we’re accruing data. With such a large quantity and assortment of data available, it begs the question: How the heck are we going to organize it and make it open? In this episode, we bring this question to two open data experts: Dr. Monica Granados, Open Climate Campaign Manager at Creative Commons and Dr. Gracielle Higino, Open Science mentor and consultant at the University of British Columbia.

S4E01 Down to Earth: What is Open Science?

Climate change. Poverty. Inequality. Violence. These days, we are facing an unprecedented number of global challenges that require collaboration across countries to resolve. That’s why some scientists in particular are pushing for a move towards open science – namely, science that is more transparent, accessible and inclusive. But what exactly is open science, and what does it entail? In this episode, we speak with Yo Yehudi, Executive Director of Open Life Science to examine exactly what’s involved in this movement to make science more accessible!

Down to Earth: Season 4 ”Open Science” Trailer

Open science! It's a thing!

Welcome back to “Down to Earth”, a 30-minute podcast about innovative geoscience and the incredible people behind it.

For season 4, we’re collaborating with NASA and the IEEE Geoscience and Remote Sensing Society to dig deep into this fascinating frontier.

Whether you're an active researcher or you just love science, join me, Stephanie Tumampos, and our guests as we explore the depth and gravity of all things open science!

Our new season of Down To Earth: A podcast for geoscientists by geoscientists starts in February 2023, for the year of open science. 

S3E08 Down to Earth: Culturally-relevant climate change solutions through innovation

As we continue to face unprecedented climate challenges that disrupt our ways of living, organizations like Space4Innovation and GEO Indigenous Alliance are turning to citizen science to design innovative climate change solutions that are culturally relevant. In this episode, we speak to Diana Mastracci Sanchez, founder of Space4Innovation and International Strategic Liaison of the GEO Indigenous Alliance, about her work seeking creative ways to maximize the impact of current technologies and Earth Observation data to empower social change initiatives.

S3E07 Down to Earth: Growing the next generation of climate scientists

While scientists are building new remote sensing networks in Costa Rica, others are merging networks to build capacity across Africa. Through her work as the Co-Founder of African Women in GIS, Geospatial Analyst Chidimma Umeogu Maduka is supporting other women in pursuing geoscience. At the same time, she’s also applying her geospatial knowledge to tackle the socio-economic barriers Nigerians are facing on the climate change front. From helping assess when and where to plant trees as part of Nigeria’s reforestation campaigns, to bringing visibility to the amazing women geoscientists across Africa, Chiddima is all about using remote sensing for empowerment!