For my final data visualization project, I chose to work with the CaliPopGen spreadsheet, which contains data about Calfornia's spread and diversity of species.
I wanted to create a visualization that would allow users to explore Calfornia's diverse ecosystem, from the entire state to a user-defined area.
In my visualization, each data point is represented as a dot, green if a plant, brown if an animal, gray if a fungus, and blue if a chromist, with a latitude and longitude on the map of where it was sampled.
To interact with the visualization, you can:
Hover over data points and look in the bottom left corner of the screen to learn about what species they are and the sample size for that location
Check and uncheck the "error radius" box to change the circle from a constant size to the size of the coordinate error radius, in kilometers
Analyze a specific area on the map by pressing "1" to set the center of the circle, "2" to set the edge, and "r" to reset
Once you have created your circle, you can learn about the spread of species in that area in the display column
One interesting thing I noticed during this project is the vast majority of species measured was animals. Perhaps California has a lot of animal diversity, but not plant diversity?
Something I still wonder about is why data point in Alaska and Mexico were included, and why there is a large amount of variability in the error radius for data points.