Team: 59
School: New Mexico School for the Arts
Area of Science: Environmental Science
Proposal: Summary:
Forest fires are a major threat in northern New Mexico; we need to better understand how to predict their movement in order to protect our forests and people. We hope to model the behavior of forest fires in Northern New Mexico, using both physical scientific experimentations and computer based modeling. We will begin by creating a physical model by burning paper with different inclines and moisture levels to emulate physical elements of forests such as slope and vegetation. Then we will use NetLogo to create an agent-based model to recreate our experimental results. This will model will incorporate GIS data for forests in Northern NM. If we have more time, we’d like to extend our model to account for spotting and evacuation planning.
Team Members:
Brandon Morrison
Rowan Jansens
Madelyn Kingston
Maya Landess
Sponsoring Teacher: Mohit Dubey
Mentor: Stephen Guerin
Key Questions:
How does incline affect how a fire spreads?
What is the mechanism behind spotting and how does that spread a fire?
How can we better predict where fires will go to aid in evacuation?
Team Members:
Madelyn Kingston
Rowan Jansens
Maya Landess
Brandon Morrison
Sponsoring Teacher: Mohit Dubey