Yan Lin is an associate professor in the Department of Geography at Penn State. Her research sits at the intersection of geographic information science (GIScience), health and medical geography, and community-based research to better understand how human health, social conditions, and the environment are connected across places and communities. She studies health disparities, including cancer and environmental health disparities, with much of her work developed through collaborations with Indigenous communities in the United States. Using mapping, spatial analysis, and community-based approaches, she works to better understand how environmental exposures and social conditions shape health outcomes. Her research also examines how uncertainty in spatial data and modeling influences scientific findings and our understanding of health disparities.

Project Title: Participatory Metadata as Ethical Infrastructure for Environmental Data: Integrating CARE Principles and Critical Data Studies through Community-Based Research

Abstract: This project examines how environmental data can be shared while maintaining the cultural, geographic, and community context from which the data originate. Guided by the CARE principles – Collective Benefit, Authority to Control, Responsibility, and Ethics – the project addresses limitations of open-data systems that emphasize public access and reuse but often do not account for Indigenous data governance and community benefit. Working with Tribal partners, the project will co-develop metadata that includes both scientific and cultural context. Using a livestock and environmental health study developed through a long-term partnership with an Indigenous community, the project will apply these approaches within the Environmental Data Initiative repository to better represent community knowledge, data interpretation, and local meaning alongside technical data records.