Geographic profiling in Nazi Berlin: fact and fiction

Geographic profiling uses the locations of connected crime sites to make inferences about the probable location of the offender’s ‘anchor point’ (usually a home, but sometimes a workplace). We show how the basic ideas of the method were used in a Gestapo investigation that formed the basis of a classic German novel about domestic resistance to the Nazis during the Second World War. We use modern techniques to re-analyse this case, and show that these successfully locate the Berlin home address of Otto and Elise Hampel, who had distributed hundreds of anti-Nazi postcards, after analysing just 34 of the 214 incidents that took place before their arrest. Our study provides the first empirical evidence to support the suggestion that analysis of minor terrorism-related acts such as graffiti and theft could be used to help locate terrorist bases before more serious incidents occur

Using geographic profiling to locate elusive nocturnal animals: A case study with spectral tarsiers

© 2015 The Zoological Society of London. Estimates of biodiversity, population size, population density and habitat use have important implications for management of both species and habitats, yet are based on census data that can be extremely difficult to collect. Traditional assessment techniques are often limited by time and money and by the difficulties of working in certain habitats, and species become more difficult to find as population size decreases. Particular difficulties arise when studying elusive species with cryptic behaviours. Here, we show how geographic profiling (GP) - a statistical tool originally developed in criminology to prioritize large lists of suspects in cases of serial crime - can be used to address these problems. We ask whether GP can be used to locate sleeping sites of spectral tarsiers Tarsius tarsier in Sulawesi, Southeast Asia, using as input the positions at which tarsier vocalizations were recorded in the field. This novel application of GP is potentially of value as tarsiers are cryptic and nocturnal and can easily be overlooked in habitat assessments (e.g. in dense rainforest). Our results show that GP provides a useful tool for locating sleeping sites of this species, and indeed analysis of a preliminary dataset during field work strongly suggested the presence of a sleeping tree at a previously unknown location; two sleeping trees were subsequently found within 5m of the predicted site. We believe that GP can be successfully applied to locating the nests, dens or roosts of elusive animals such as tarsiers, potentially improving estimates of population size with important implications for management of both species and habitats.We thank Operation Wallacea for supporting S.C.F. in thisproject and for providing logistical support for the fieldwork,and Aidan Kelsey for invaluable assistance in the field. Wethank the Indonesian Institute of Sciences (LIPI) andKementerian Riset dan Teknologi Republik Indonesia(RISTEK) for providing permission to undertake the work(RISTEK permit no. 211/SIP/FRP/SM/VI/2013, and BalaiKonservasi Sumber Daya Alam (BKSDA) for theirassistance

Spatial targeting of infectious disease control: identifying multiple, unknown sources

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Spatial methods for infectious disease outbreak investigations: systematic literature review

Investigations of infectious disease outbreaks are conventionally framed in terms of person, time and place. Although geographic information systems have increased the range of tools available, spatial analyses are used relatively infrequently. We conducted a systematic review of published reports of outbreak investigations worldwide to estimate the prevalence of spatial methods, describe the techniques applied and explore their utility. We identified 80 reports using spatial methods published between 1979 and 2013, ca 0.4% of the total number of published outbreaks. Environmental or waterborne infections were the most commonly investigated, and most reports were from the United Kingdom. A range of techniques were used, including simple dot maps, cluster analyses and modelling approaches. Spatial tools were usefully applied throughout investigations, from initial confirmation of the outbreak to describing and analysing cases and communicating findings. They provided valuable insights that led to public health actions, but there is scope for much wider implementation and development of new methods.</jats:p

Geographic profiling as a novel spatial tool for targeting infectious disease control

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Geographic profiling is a statistical tool originally developed in criminology to prioritise large lists of suspects in cases of serial crime. Here, we use two data sets - one historical and one modern - to show how it can be used to locate the sources of infectious disease.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>First, we re-analyse data from a classic epidemiological study, the 1854 London cholera outbreak. Using 321 disease sites as input, we evaluate the locations of 13 neighbourhood water pumps. The Broad Street pump - the outbreak's source- ranks first, situated in the top 0.2% of the geoprofile. We extend our study with an analysis of reported malaria cases in Cairo, Egypt, using 139 disease case locations to rank 59 mosquitogenic local water sources, seven of which tested positive for the vector <it>Anopheles sergentii</it>. Geographic profiling ranks six of these seven sites in positions 1-6, all in the top 2% of the geoprofile. In both analyses the method outperformed other measures of spatial central tendency.</p> <p>Conclusions</p> <p>We suggest that geographic profiling could form a useful component of integrated control strategies relating to a wide variety of infectious diseases, since evidence-based targeting of interventions is more efficient, environmentally friendly and cost-effective than untargeted intervention.</p

Status Poles and Status Zoning to Model Residential Land Prices: Status-Quality Trade off Theory (Short Paper)

This study describes an approach for augmenting urban residential preference and hedonic house price models by incorporating Status-Quality Trade Off theory (SQTO). SQTO seeks explain the dynamic of urban structure using a multipolar, in which the location and strength of poles is driven by notions of residential status and dwelling quality. This paper presents in outline an approach for identifying status poles and for quantifying their effect on land and residential property prices. The results show how the incorporation of SQTO results in an enhanced understanding of variations in land / property process with increased spatial nuance. A number of future research areas are identified related to the status pole weights and the development of status pole index

Spatially clustered count data provide more efficient search strategies in invasion biology and disease control.

Geographic profiling, a mathematical model originally developed in criminology, is increasingly being used in ecology and epidemiology. Geographic profiling boasts a wide range of applications, such as finding source populations of invasive species or breeding sites of vectors of infectious disease. The model provides a cost-effective approach for prioritising search strategies for source locations and does so via simple data in the form of the positions of each observation, such as individual sightings of invasive species or cases of a disease. In doing so, however, classic geographic profiling approaches fail to make the distinction between those areas containing observed absences and those areas where no data were recorded. Absence data are generated via spatial sampling protocols but are often discarded during the inference process. Here we construct a geographic profiling model that resolves these issues by making inferences via count data - analysing a set of discrete sentinel locations at which the number of encounters has been recorded. Crucially, in our model this number can be zero. We verify the ability of this new model to estimate source locations and other parameters of practical interest via a Bayesian power analysis. We also measure model performance via real-world data in which the model infers breeding locations of mosquitoes in bromeliads in Miami-Dade County, Florida. In both cases, our novel model produces more efficient search strategies by shifting focus from those areas containing observed absences to those with no data, an improvement over existing models that treat these areas equally. Our model makes important improvements upon classic geographic profiling methods, which will significantly enhance real-world efforts to develop conservation management plans and targeted interventions

Computation of Electrostatic Field near Three-Dimensional Corners and Edges

Theoretically, the electric field becomes infinite at corners of two and three dimensions and edges of three dimensions. Conventional finite-element and boundary element methods do not yield satisfactory results at close proximity to these singular locations. In this paper, we describe the application of a fast and accurate BEM solver (which usesexact analytic expressions to compute the effect of source distributions on flatsurfaces) to compute the electric field near three-dimensional corners and edges. Results have been obtained for distances as close as 1$\mu m$ near the corner/edge and good agreement has been observed between the present results and existing analytical solutions.Comment: Presented in International Conference on Computational and Experimental Engineering and Sciences held at IIT Madras, Chennai, India, during 1-6 December, 200