Anniversary party kicks off CASA seminar series

Vanessa Lawrence, CEO and Director-General of the Ordnance Survey, presented a keynote lecture entitled 'Geographic information - Enabling the Nation', in which she spoke about the importance of geographic information to many aspects of society. She emphasised the way in which spatial information now underpins every sector of modern society, illustrating her talk with examples of how geographic information systems (GIS) could save money and lives.

UCL President and Provost Professor Malcolm Grant, introducing Ms Lawrence, spoke of the importance of the links between UCL and Ordnance Survey, the national mapping agency of Great Britain, through the many PhD students and projects that the agency has sponsored.

CASA was set up by a group in UCL, involving the departments of Geography, and Geomatic Engineering, The Institute of Archaeology, the Centre for Transport Studies and the Bartlett School. Its mission is to develop computer models and methods in these domains with a focus on built environment and human settlements. CASA also interacts with UCL Computer Science and the Department of Geography at Birkbeck College.

The 10th anniversary party was the first of a series of seminars this term to celebrate CASA reaching this milestone. The centre will be welcoming a host of other guest speakers from all over the world, to discuss topics as varied as 'observing the Earth from space' and 'topology of urban networks'.

To find out more, use the links at the bottom of this article

• Links:
• UCL Centre for Advanced Spatial Analysis
• Ordnance Survey