Katie Corcoran is a PhD student in the Department of Anthropology. Since 2013, she has been working as a graduate intern with the Oak Ridge National Laboratory’s Geographic Information Science and Technology Group, and spent this past summer at the Naval Postgraduate School’s Remote Sensing Center. She was also selected as a Naval Research Enterprise (NREIP) Graduate Intern, a competitive and prestigious award.
Corcoran’s research combines the principles of forensic anthropology and geospatial sciences by testing ground, air and space-based sensors to characterize spectral signatures and topographical changes associated with human graves. Clandestine graves are problematic on many social levels. They deny families the answers needed about missing loved ones and they deny prosecutors supportive evidence of large-scale crimes like genocide.
Her research is recognized and supported through numerous awards including a Doctoral Scholarship from the United States Geospatial Intelligence Foundation, the Goetz Instrument Support Program by PANalytical (complimentary two month lease for an ASD FieldSpec 4 Hi-Res Spectroradiometer), and the ASPRS/GeoEye (now DigitalGlobe) Foundation Award (annual collections of GeoEye-1 multispectral imagery).