Heng Cai

Heng Cai

Assistant Professor

Geographic Information Science, Geospatial Data Science, Socio-Environmental Sustainability, Disaster Resilience

  hengcai@tamu.edu

  (979) 862-4542

  Eller O&M 707C

Research

   Dr. Heng Cai’s research primarily focuses on geographic information science, disaster resilience, and socio-environmental sustainability, and environmental health. She leads the GIScience for Resilience (GIResilience) Research Group (https://www.gis-resilience.info). The research group conducts research to describe, model, and predict human activities and environmental changes, and their complex interactions under the threats posed by recurrent natural hazards and persistent climate changes through geospatial data mining, modeling, and decision-making support tool development. Dr. Cai is actively recruiting undergraduate, MS, and PhD students to join her research group at Texas A&M University. If you are interested in working in her research group, please email her at hengcai@tamu.edu with your CV/resume.

Selected Publications

Selected peer-reviewed journal articles:

Cai H, Lam NSN, Zou L. 2022. Incorporating neighborhood-scale effect into land loss modeling using semivariograms. Journal of Geographic Systems. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10109-021-00372-4

Cai H. 2022. Overlay. The Geographic Information Science & Technology Body of Knowledge (1st Quarter 2022 Edition), John P. Wilson (ed.). DOI: 10.22224/gistbok/2022.1.2. https://gistbok.ucgis.org/bok-topics/overlay

Lam NSN, Cai H, Zou L. 2022. Editorial for the Special Issue: “Human-Environment Interactions Research Using Remote Sensing”. Remote Sensing.14(11):2720. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14112720

Zhou B, Zou L, Mostafavi A, Lin B, Yang M, Gharaibeh N, Cai H, Abedin J, Mandal D. 2022. VictimFinder: harvesting rescue requests on social media during disasters with BERT. Computers, Environment, and Urban Systems. 95: 101824. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.compenvurbsys.2022.101824

Yang M, Zou L, Cai H, Qiang Y, Lin B, Zhou B, Abedin J, Mandal D. 2022. Spatial–Temporal Land Loss Modeling and Simulation in a Vulnerable Coast: A Case Study in Coastal Louisiana. Remote Sensing. 14(4):896. https://doi.org/10.3390/rs14040896

Lin B, Zou L, Duffield N, Mostafavi A, Cai H, Zhou B, Tao J, Yang M, Mandal D, Abedin J. 2022. Revealing the Global Linguistic and Geographical Disparities of Public Awareness to Covid-19 Outbreak through social media. International Journal of Digital Earth. 15(1):868-889. https://doi.org/10.1080/17538947.2022.2070677

Correll R, Lam NSN, Mihunov V, Zou L, Cai H. 2021. Economics over Risk: Flooding is not the only driving factor of migration considerations on a vulnerable coast. Annals of the American Association of Geographers. DOI: 10.1080/24694452.2020.1766409.

Zou L, Lam NSN, Shams S, Cai H, Meyer MA, Yang S, Lee K, Park SJ, Reams MA. 2019. Social and geographical disparities in Twitter use during Hurricane Harvey. International Journal of Digital Earth, DOI: 10.1080/17538947.2018.1545878.

Cai, H, Lam NSN, Zou L, Qiang Y. 2018. Modeling the dynamics of community resilience to coastal hazards using a Bayesian network. Annals of the American Association of Geographers, 108(5):1260-1279.

Cai H, Lam NSN, Qiang Y, Zou L, Correll R, Mihunov V. 2018. A synthesis of resilience measurement methods and indices. International Journal of Disaster Risk Reduction, 31:844-855.

Zou L, Lam NSN, Cai H, Qiang Y. 2018. Mining Twitter data for improved understanding of disaster resilience. Annals of the American Association of Geographers, 108(5): 1422-1441.

Lam NSN, Cheng WJ, Zou L, Cai H. 2018. Effects of landscape fragmentation on land loss. Remote Sensing of Environment, 209:253-262.

Lam NSN, Qiang Y, Li K, Cai H, Zou L, Mihunov V. 2018. Extending resilience assessment to dynamic system modeling: Perspectives on human dynamics and climate change research. Journal of Coastal Research, 85(sp1):1401-1405.

Lam NSN, Xu YJ, Liu KB, Dismukes DE, Reams MA, Pace RK, Qiang Y, Narra S, Li K, Bianchette T, Cai H, Zou L. 2018. Understanding the Mississippi River Delta as a coupled natural-human system: research methods, challenges, and prospects. Water, 10(8):1054.

Qiang Y, Lam NSN, Cai H, Zou L. 2017. Changes in exposure to flood hazards in the United States. Annals of the American Association of Geographers, 107(6):1-19.

Cai H, Lam NSN, Zou L, Qiang Y, Li K. 2016. Assessing community resilience to coastal hazards in the Lower Mississippi River Basin. Water, 8(2):46.

Zou L, Kent J, Lam NSN, Cai H, Qiang Y, Li K. 2015. Evaluating land subsidence rates and their implications for land loss in the Lower Mississippi River Basin. Water, 8(1):10.

Li K, Lam NSN, Qiang Y, Zou L, Cai H. 2015. A cyberinfrastructure for community resilience assessment and visualization. Cartography and Geographic Information Science, 42(sup1):34-39.

Education

Ph.D.  Environmental Science, Louisiana State University
M.S.   Geographic Information Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China       
B.E.    Surveying and Mapping, China University of Geosciences, Beijing, China

Courses

Applications in GIS

GIS Programming

WebGIS

GeoDatabases

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