ALBERT

Description: Geodesy utilizes state of the art data collection techniques such as GPS (Global Positioning System) to acquire locations of points. Traditionally, the coordinates of these points are estimated using the Least Squares (LS) method. Nevertheless, Robust Estimation (RE) yields more accurate results than LS method in the presence of blunders (gross errors) among the data set. For example, the Least Trimmed Squares (LTS) method and the Least Median Squares (LMS) method can be used for this purpose. The first method aims to minimize the sum of the squared residuals by trimming away observations with large residuals. On the other hand, the second method involves the minimization of the median of the squared residuals. Both methods can be implemented using an optimization method, i.e., Artificial Bee Colony (ABC) algorithm. The ABC algorithm is a swarm intelligence (a branch of artificial intelligence) technique that can be used for the solution of minimization or maximization problems. In this paper, using the LTS and LMS methods for GPS data by employing the ABC, a new approach is put forward. Firstly, some discussions about the theoretical principals of RE and ABC are given. Then, a numerical example is used to demonstrate the validity of the proposed approach. Numerical results show that application of the robust estimation to GPS data can easily be carried out by ABC and this approach helps to enhance the reliability of geospatial data for any application of geodesy.

Description: In the streams of the Mediterranean island of Crete (Greece), olive mill wastewater (OMW) has been reported to reduce biodiversity up to 85 %. Mere conduction of impact assessment based on pollutant concentrations, however, cannot reveal how impacted areas may be connected to the pollution sources. In this study, we developed a new methodology which allows for a dynamic cause-effect linking of pollution sources and impacted areas through the pathways of OMW. Risk is hierarchically assessed and mapped at three different scales and more specifically, at the source scale (targeting olive mill units and their waste tanks), at the receptor scale (targeting potential impacted sites in the streams) and at the watershed scale (which is the scale of overall water management). The approach is based mainly on remote sensing data without taking account of groundwater regimes or field measurements. Involvement of local experts for recognizing spatial features of interest and selecting appropriate risk parameters was proved necessary and efficient in order to model the stream pollution risk realistically. Potential impacted sites in the stream network were occasionally verified by a field survey. The results comprise a set of risk maps at the three different scales. The constructed digital geo-database can be updated or modified and thus is considered to be a dynamic tool for future environmental management in the service of the local community.

Description: This paper describes a technique to transform coordinates between map references based on NTv2 format grids. Using the grids rather than carrying out a transformation allows to avoid map archives doubling, thereby easing “on the fly” transformation between different map representations. The paper also includes a case-study on a highway stretch currently under construction, the ‘Pedemontana Lombarda’ highway.

Description: In contrary to the numbers of qualitative studies, there is few quantitative studies have been done on defining climate zone boundaries and on illustrating differences inside a zone. In order to find quantitative methods to demarcate a physical geography boundary and to reveal the agro-climatic resources differences of the South Subtropical Zone in Fujian Province of China based on the data collected from limited and discrete weather stations, this research tries to develop models that use mathematics methods and Geographical Information System (GIS) technology. Three modeling methods - Discriminant Analysis, Trend-surface with Residual (TSR) Analysis, and Digital Elevation Model (DEM) were applied in the study to produce a distribution grid system of a set of indicators, and to define the spatial location of the zone boundary precisely. The results of the study show that the outputs of the models have very high significant level in statistical tests.

Description: With GLONASS completed its full constellation and the rapid increasing number of GNSS receivers, it is worthwhile to investigate the availability of GLONASS-only in positioning. In this paper, two networks of different baseline length, located in two different regions are analyzed. For both networks, GLONASS and GPS observations are processed respectively for 175 days since GLONASS recovered FOC. The RMS and STD of the coordinates minus those from the International GNSS Service weekly solutions are analyzed. The statistics over a long period empirically demonstrate that the averaged coordinate repeatabilities of GLONASS are slightly worse than that of GPS results. The estimated ZTDs of GLONASS is about 1–2 mm worse than GPS results. For both networks, the GLONASS coordinates show some systematic effect as a function of antenna + radome type, caused by the using of GPS derived PCC models. The systematic effect varied form several mm to 1 cm for different stations with different antenna + radome types, which indicates that GLONASS-specific PCC models are mandatory in GLONASS high precision positioning.

Description: Cellular Automata (CA) simulation models have been increasingly used in land use studies. However, neighborhood configuration, an essential element of CA model, remarkably impacts the accuracy of simulated results. Moreover, errors from data source may propagate through the CA modeling process. The objective of this study is to analyze the effect of neighborhood configuration to CA model and further on to explore its capacity of resisting disturbance from data source error. With statistic-based CA model and several neighborhood configurations respectively, the land use changes of Wuhan, China were analyzed. It is demonstrated that there are significant differences on the simulated results produced by different neighborhoods. Besides, different neighborhoods respond differently to data source error. In light of these results, we find out that (1) neighborhood configurations with larger neighborhood size and planar neighborhood type, introduced in this paper, contribute to higher prediction accuracy; and (2) the neighborhood configurations above also have higher capacity of resisting disturbance from data source error and give rise to more stable simulated results. This study provides a comprehensive basis for scale selection of CA model with a meaningful consideration of data source error and thus will improve the research on land use change.

Description: Drought is a significant disaster in Beijing and it is important to find a method to assess the drought condition. First, this paper collected data of 85 soil monitoring stations in Beijing, such as soil dry bulk densities, saturated water contents, field capacities. Then, spatial variability characteristics of soil physics parameters were investigated by GIS and other three factors, 10 cm soil moisture content, organic matter and saturated water content which notably influenced soil moisture were extracted by Principal Component Analysis (PCA). Furthermore, four different nonlinear methods were put forward to predict crop-root zone soil water. 15555 single daily data from 2011 were used in parameters determination, while 15470 double daily data were used to test. The result showed that the Least Square Support Vector Machine coupling Particle Swarm Optimization Algorithm (PSO-LSSVM) ( R 2  = 0. 875) did better than BP Neural Network ( R 2  = 0. 840), Generalized Regression Neural Network (GRNN) ( R 2  = 0. 850) and Wavelet Neural Network (WNN) ( R 2  = 0. 853). As so the POS-LSSVM method was used to evaluate the drought conditions from October 2010 to March 2011 of Beijing, and the result showed that from October 2010 to January 2011, the drought conditions were getting increasingly worse while later relieved from January 2011 to March 2011.

Description: This paper is intended to investigate the effect of Narmab storage dam on downstream inundated area for three reservoir operation scenarios. ArcView GIS was coupled with HEC-RAS to produce a flood map for flood discharge of different return periods. Google-Earth software was applied to depict the extent of floodplain in actual landscape. The inflow hydrographs for 4 return periods (50-, 100-, 500- and 1,000-year) were routed through Puls method in order to obtain the outflow hydrographs passing through dam spillway. Results show that, through the operation of reservoir, the downstream inundated area can be reduced up to 75.1 % as a function of reservoir available storage. Furthermore, calculations showed that the reduction rate of inundated area for 50-year floods is largely more than 1,000-year floods, implies the high ability of Narmab dam on flood control especially for floods with shorter return period.

Description:    Geological time description largely rests on an event based chronology based on the stratigraphical model . It uses a hierarchy of chronologically ordered geochronological units and boundaries . In order to be easily dealt with within large databases used by complex engineering systems, the geological time chronology must be formalized. Stratigraphical time successions should accordingly be described by using adequate semantic tools (ontologies) complemented by a set of logical rules. At present, geological time formalization mainly rests on the GeoSciML model. This model is fit for describing individual geological time scales but does not provide all the necessary tools for comparing various time successions and for operating full stratigraphic correlations. For complementing the GeoSciML model, we define two ontologies for geological time description and for geological dating. They extend the GeoSciML model, so that it becomes possible to fully use the Allen rules for operating time correlations between any couple of time scales or stratigraphic successions. We additionally propose a codification resting on the defined ontologies, which allows operating all age identification and correlation by means of simple computation rules. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-16 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0080-9 Authors Michel Perrin, Ecole des Mines de Paris, Paris, France Laura S. Mastella, Ecole des Mines de Paris, Paris, France Olivier Morel, Bureau de Recherches Géologiques et Minières, Orléans, France Alexandre Lorenzatti, Institut Français du Pétrole, Rueil-Malmaison, France Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description: Evaluation of land cover/use change and its impact on hydrological design aspects plays a vital role in assessing the capacity of existing storm water conveyance systems and its capability towards the anticipated peak flow. This paper attempts to illustrate an application of Soil Conservation Service (SCS-CN) method for runoff estimation using continuous time series rainfall. And also, the present work proposes a Land use factor based on the Curve Number to correct the infiltration rate according to the prevailing land cover/use. Indian remote sensing (IRS) satellite data for the years 1989, 1992, 1995, 1998, 2001, 2004, 2007, and 2010 are used to evaluate the growth of Tiruchirapalli city, India city and to assess its impact on surface runoff. The Geographical information system (GIS) is used to prepare the different layers belonging to various land covers identified from remotely sensed data. The sub-watersheds are created using Digital Elevation Model (DEM) prepared by ARC GIS software. The single storm event and 50-year return period rainfall data are used as a hydrological input to the model to evaluate the increase in runoff over the years due to change in the land cover of the study area. The study reveals that the impact of land cover/use change is more significant for longer duration storm than short duration storm at the same magnitude. Further, it is noticed from the study that the runoff depth and runoff co-efficient is large for short duration rainfall than long duration rainfall at the same magnitude.

Description: To use data proficiently and efficiently, scientists require comprehensive metadata. This is very difficult to reconstruct conceptually, positionally and temporally far from the time and place of data acquisition. The European Commission funded Eurofleets project, whose mission is to build an integrated European oceanographic research vessel fleet, is developing a system that aims to address this issue by capturing metadata in a uniform way at time of observation. As this is a European-wide initiative, the problems associated with the desired level of integration are also broad. Having so many partners, different paradigms, schools, practices and vocabularies must be taken into consideration. Assuming that this divergence is natural and even somehow positive in the perspective of adapting to a changing environment, we detail how bridging can take place using a systemic approach. In the Eurofleets experience, this relied on the definition of a boundary object: that is an artifact that can be used by each of the diverging communities, since it embeds the core, shared conceptual entities. The structure of the boundary object is based on an event model, its ontology and the controlled vocabularies linked to it. All conceptual entities, and indeed the structure of the boundary object itself, resulted from wide discussions among the divergent communities. These discussions, allowed the extension of meaning from a semantic perspective to the pragmatic scope, where theoretical and cultural matters can also be considered, so that, eventually, the knowledge represented by the boundary object is more likely to be understood across the divergent communities. To exploit the possibilities offered by the boundary object, specific software has been developed that, using the event model and ontology, allows easier deployment across the project partners of a system intended to address the heterogeneity of the research vessel fleet. In this paper we describe in detail the underlying ontology.

Description:    Many GIS-based landslide models require detailed datasets that are ideally collected from field measurements, which can incur high costs for carrying out surveys. Even when the data is on hand, implementing physics-based slope stability techniques can be difficult. Common research practice uses differential equations to characterize the dynamic flow of a landslide, but it is often laborious without making substantial simplifications. A possible solution is to implement a cellular automata modeling approach, which represents both spatial and temporal components, to simulate the dynamics of the landslide propagation process. In this study, a simplified cellular automata model is developed for the effective prediction of landslide runouts, where the data requirement is a high resolution digital elevation model (DEM). Parameters, such as slope and slope curvature features, are derived from the DEM and coupled with logistic regression. The developed model is implemented on the Patrick and Dawson-Chu Slide in North Vancouver, Canada. The results from this study site were favorable, given almost 90% agreement between simulated landslides and data obtained for real landslides. In addition, sensitivity analysis was performed on the initiation sites to test the model logic and outputs of the landslide flow. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-12 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0078-3 Authors Terence Lai, Spatial Analysis and Modeling Laboratory, Department of Geography, Simon Fraser University, 8888 University Drive, Burnaby, BC V5A 1S6, Canada Suzana Dragićević, Spatial Analysis and Modeling Laboratory, Department of Geography, Simon Fraser University, 8888 University Drive, Burnaby, BC V5A 1S6, Canada Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    Establishing and successfully implementing new numerical computational technique(s) with simulation tool is one of the most important difficult tasks in order to carry out real time scientific astronomical and other sophisticated problems. The main focus and highlight of this paper is concerned with the introduction of a newly proposed simple embedded RKAHeM(4,4) technique to determine the distribution of thermodynamic variables inside protoplanets during pre-collapse stage, formed by gravitational instability, for protoplanetary masses between 0.3 to 10 Jupiter masses. The case of convection is a significant concern for transference of heat inside the protoplanet and the graphical solution demonstrates positively better performance by inducting the newly proposed effective RKAHeM(4,4) algorithm for any length of time in comparison with the results through Classical Runge–Kutta method. Furthermore, the analytic expression for local truncation error, global truncation error and error estimates are derived for better understanding. A viable quantitative analysis has been carried out to clearly visualize the goodness and robustness of the proposed RKAHeM(4,4) algorithm. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-9 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0093-4 Authors Sukumar Senthilkumar, School of Mathematical Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Pulau Pinang, 11800 Penang, Malaysia Gour Chandra Paul, School of Mathematical Sciences, Universiti Sains Malaysia, Pulau Pinang, 11800 Penang, Malaysia Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    As many sensor networks are currently being deployed for environmental monitoring, there is a growing need to develop systems and applications for managing, processing and retrieving massive amounts of data generated from those networks. In this research, a query answering system with pattern mining techniques is investigated specifically for marine sensor data. We consider three applications of pattern mining: similar pattern search, predictive query and query by clustering. In pattern mining for query answering, we adopt the dynamic time warping (DTW) method for similarity measurement. We also propose the use of a query relaxation approach that recommends users change parameters of a given query to get an answer. Finally, we show implementation results of pattern query answering in a marine sensor network deployed in the South East of Tasmania, Australia. Pattern query answering system benefits in accessing and discovering knowledge from sensor data for decision making purposes. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-17 DOI 10.1007/s12145-012-0095-x Authors Md. Sumon Shahriar, Tasmanian ICT Centre, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), Castray Esplanade, Hobart, 7001 Australia Paulo de Souza, Tasmanian ICT Centre, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), Castray Esplanade, Hobart, 7001 Australia Greg Timms, Tasmanian ICT Centre, Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), Castray Esplanade, Hobart, 7001 Australia Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    The water and energy transfer of land surface is complex due to its large spatial and temporal variability. The modeling and simulation is an important means to study land water and energy transfer, but most selection and analysis of model parameters are empirical and qualitative. This paper has proposed a method of quantitatively identifying the most influential parameters of Common Land Model through Sobol’ sensitivity analysis. Considering sensible heat flux as the model output, the first order and total sensitivity indices of 25 model input parameters are estimated using an improved Sobol’ method. The simulated results are resampled using a bootstrapping method and the corresponding sensitivity indices are calculated. Confidence intervals for the bootstrapping sensitivity indices are estimated by using a percentile method. The results show that the parameters phi0 and porsl are the most important parameters, followed by ref(2,1), tran(2,1) and bsw. Five out of 25 parameters need to have an accurate evaluation, while the other parameters are fixed to a certain value. The sensitivity indices of parameters phi0 and porsl are decreasing after precipitation, while the sensitivity indices of parameters tran(2, 1) and ref(2, 1) are increasing after precipitation. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-13 DOI 10.1007/s12145-012-0105-z Authors Jianhui Xu, State Key Laboratory of Information Engineering in Surveying, Mapping and Remote Sensing, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China 430079 Hong Shu, State Key Laboratory of Information Engineering in Surveying, Mapping and Remote Sensing, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China 430079 Hongnan Jiang, Resource and Environmental Science College, Xinjiang University, Urumqi, China 830046 Lin Dong, State Key Laboratory of Information Engineering in Surveying, Mapping and Remote Sensing, Wuhan University, Wuhan, China 430079 Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    This paper identifies three distinct data production paradigms for Earth science data, each having its own versioning structure: –  Climate data record production, used when the data producer’s dominant concern is providing a homogeneous error structure for each data set version, particularly when the data record is expected to cover a long time period –  Operational data set production, used when the producer must ensure low latency and service continuity with less attention to error homogeneity across the entire record –  Exploratory production, used for validation or research in which the producer decides which processes to apply by interacting with the data. In this paradigm, there may not be a common versioning structure from one production episode to another This paper then develops a mathematical framework for three provenance tracing activities that are important in long-term preservation of Earth science data: –  tracing the history of data production that created an item of Earth science data, with particular attention to the versioning structure of the data collections –  tracing the history of custody for an item –  tracing the history of Intellectual Property Rights transfers for an item Each of these activities has its own type of Directed Acyclic Graph (DAG) underlying a particular kind of provenance. Provenance tracing is equivalent to performing a Breadth First Search on the appropriate DAG. Content Type Journal Article Category Software Article Pages 167-196 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0057-0 Authors Bruce R. Barkstrom, 15 Josie Lane, Asheville, NC USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473 Journal Volume Volume 3 Journal Issue Volume 3, Number 3

Description:    The harmonic synthesis and analysis of the elements of gravitational tensor can be done in few minutes if a suitable programming algorithm is used. Vectorization is an efficient technique for such processes, but the size of matrices will increase when the resolution of synthesis or analysis is high; say higher than 0.5° × 0.5°. Here, we present a technique to manage the computer memory and computational time by excluding one computational loop from the matrix products and we call this method semi-vectorization. Based on this technique, we synthesize the gravitational tensor using the EGM96 geopotential model and after that we analyze the tensor for recovering the geopotential coefficients. MATLAB codes are provided which are able to analyze 224 millions gradiometric data, corresponding to a global grid of 2.5′ × 2.5′ on a sphere in 1,093 s by a personal computer with 2 Gb RAM. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 149-158 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0062-3 Authors Mehdi Eshagh, Division of Geodesy, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden Makan Abdollahzadeh, Division of Geodesy, Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473 Journal Volume Volume 3 Journal Issue Volume 3, Number 3

Description:    Time Series Data Server (TSDS) is a software package for implementing a server that provides fast super-setting, sub-setting, filtering, and uniform gridding of time series-like data. TSDS was developed to respond quickly to requests for long time spans of data. Data may be served from a fast database, typically created by aggregating granules (e.g., data files) from a remote data source and storing them in a local cache that is optimized for serving time series. The system was designed specifically for time series data, and is optimized for requests where the longest dimension of the requested data structure is time. Scalar, vector, and spectrogram time series types are supported. The user can interact with the server by requesting a time series, a date range, and an optional filter to apply to the data. Available filters include strides, block average/minimum/maximum, exclude, and inequality. Constraint expressions are supported, which allow such operations as a request for data from one time series when a different time series satisfied a specified relationship. TSDS builds upon DAP (Data Access Protocol), NcML (netCDF Mark-up language) and related software libraries. In this work, we describe the current design of this server, as well as planned features and potential implementation strategies. Content Type Journal Article Category Software Article Pages 29-40 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0059-y Authors Robert S. Weigel, George Mason University Fairfax USA Doug M. Lindholm, University of Colorado Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics Boulder CO USA Anne Wilson, University of Colorado Laboratory for Atmospheric and Space Physics Boulder CO USA Jeremy Faden, Cottage Systems Iowa City IA USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473 Journal Volume Volume 3 Journal Issue Volume 3, Numbers 1-2

Description:    Mercury is a federated metadata harvesting, search and retrieval tool based on both open source packages and custom software developed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL). It was originally developed for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), and the consortium now includes funding from NASA, U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), and U.S. Department of Energy (DOE). Mercury is itself a reusable software application which uses a service-oriented architecture (SOA) approach to capturing and managing metadata in support of twelve Earth science projects. Mercury also supports the reuse of metadata by enabling searches across a range of metadata specification and standards including XML, Z39.50, FGDC, Dublin-Core, Darwin-Core, EML, and ISO-19115. It collects metadata and key data from contributing project servers distributed around the world and builds a centralized index. The Mercury search interfaces allows the users to perform simple, fielded, spatial, temporal and other hierarchical searches across these metadata sources. This centralized repository of metadata with distributed data sources provides extremely fast search results (Table 1) to the user, while allowing data providers to advertise the availability of their data and yet maintain complete control and ownership of that data. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 87-94 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0050-7 Authors Ranjeet Devarakonda, Oak Ridge National Laboratory Environmental Science Division PO Box 2008 MS6407 Oak Ridge TN 37831 USA Giriprakash Palanisamy, Oak Ridge National Laboratory Environmental Science Division PO Box 2008 MS6407 Oak Ridge TN 37831 USA Bruce E. Wilson, Oak Ridge National Laboratory Environmental Science Division PO Box 2008 MS6407 Oak Ridge TN 37831 USA James M. Green, Information International Associates 1055 Commerce Park Drive, Suite 110 Oak Ridge TN 37831 USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473 Journal Volume Volume 3 Journal Issue Volume 3, Numbers 1-2

Description:    Autoplot is software developed for the Virtual Observatories in Heliophysics to provide intelligent and automated plotting capabilities for many typical data products that are stored in a variety of file formats or databases. Autoplot has proven to be a flexible tool for exploring, accessing, and viewing data resources as typically found on the web, usually in the form of a directory containing data files with multiple parameters contained in each file. Data from a data source is abstracted into a common internal data model called QDataSet. Autoplot is built from individually useful components, and can be extended and reused to create specialized data handling and analysis applications and is being used in a variety of science visualization and analysis applications. Although originally developed for viewing heliophysics-related time series and spectrograms, its flexible and generic data representation model makes it potentially useful for the Earth sciences. Content Type Journal Article Category Software Article Pages 41-49 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0049-0 Authors Jeremy B. Faden, Cottage Systems Iowa City IA USA Robert S. Weigel, Cottage Systems Iowa City IA USA Jan Merka, Cottage Systems Iowa City IA USA Reiner H. W. Friedel, Cottage Systems Iowa City IA USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473 Journal Volume Volume 3 Journal Issue Volume 3, Numbers 1-2

Description:    The growth of data volumes in science is reaching epidemic proportions. Consequently, the status of data-oriented science as a research methodology needs to be elevated to that of the more established scientific approaches of experimentation, theoretical modeling, and simulation. Data-oriented scientific discovery is sometimes referred to as the new science of X-Informatics, where X refers to any science (e.g., Bio-, Geo-, Astro-) and informatics refers to the discipline of organizing, describing, accessing, integrating, mining, and analyzing diverse data resources for scientific discovery. Many scientific disciplines are developing formal sub-disciplines that are information-rich and data-based, to such an extent that these are now stand-alone research and academic programs recognized on their own merits. These disciplines include bioinformatics and geoinformatics, and will soon include astroinformatics. We introduce Astroinformatics, the new data-oriented approach to 21st century astronomy research and education. In astronomy, petascale sky surveys will soon challenge our traditional research approaches and will radically transform how we train the next generation of astronomers, whose experiences with data are now increasingly more virtual (through online databases) than physical (through trips to mountaintop observatories). We describe Astroinformatics as a rigorous approach to these challenges. We also describe initiatives in science education (not only in astronomy) through which students are trained to access large distributed data repositories, to conduct meaningful scientific inquiries into the data, to mine and analyze the data, and to make data-driven scientific discoveries. These are essential skills for all 21st century scientists, particularly in astronomy as major new multi-wavelength sky surveys (that produce petascale databases and image archives) and grand-scale simulations (that generate enormous outputs for model universes, such as the Millennium Simulation ) become core research components for a significant fraction of astronomical researchers. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 5-17 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0055-2 Authors Kirk D. Borne, George Mason University Department of Computational and Data Sciences Fairfax VA USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473 Journal Volume Volume 3 Journal Issue Volume 3, Numbers 1-2

Description:    We present an application of uncertainty visualization to air parcel trajectories generated from a global meteorological model. We derive an approximation of advection uncertainty due to interpolation and incorporate this uncertainty into our visualization of trajectories. Our work enables efficient visual pruning of unlikely results, especially in regions of atmospheric shear, potentially reducing erroneous interpretations. Finally, we apply these methods to a real-world meteorological problem to demonstrate its use. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 119-126 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0052-5 Authors Ryan A. Boller, NASA / Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD USA Scott A. Braun, NASA / Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD USA Jadrian Miles, Department of Computer Science, Brown University, Providence, RI USA David H. Laidlaw, Department of Computer Science, Brown University, Providence, RI USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473 Journal Volume Volume 3 Journal Issue Volume 3, Numbers 1-2

Description:    SPASE—for Space Physics Archive Search and Extract—is a group with a charter to promote collaboration and sharing of data for the Space Plasma Physics community. A major activity is the definition of the SPASE Data Model which defines the metadata necessary to describe resources in the broader heliophysics data environment. The SPASE Data Model is primarily a controlled vocabulary with hierarchical relationships and with the ability to form associations between described resources. It is the result of many years of effort by an international collaboration (see http://www.spase-group.org ) to unify and improve on existing Space and Solar Physics data models. The genesis of the SPASE group can be traced to 1998 when a small group of individuals saw a need for a data model. Today SPASE has a large international participation from many of the major space research organizations. The design of the data model is based on a set of principles derived from evaluation of the existing heliophysics data environment. The development guidelines for the data model are consistent with ISO-2788 (expanded in ANSI/NISO Z39.19) and the administration for the data model is comparable to that described in the ISO standards ISO-11179 and ISO-20943. Since the release of version 1.0 of the data model in 2005, the model has undergone a series of evolutions. SPASE released version 2.0 of its data model in April 2009. This version presents a significant change from the previous release. It includes the capability to describe a wider range of data products and to describe expert annotations which can be associated with a resource. Additional improvements include an enhanced capability to describe resource associations and a more unified approach to describing data products. Version 2.0 of the SPASE Data Model provides a solid foundation for continued integration of worldwide research activities and the open sharing of data. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 67-73 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0053-4 Authors Todd King, University of California, Los Angeles Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics Los Angeles CA USA James Thieman, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Code 690.1 Greenbelt MD USA D. Aaron Roberts, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Code 672 Greenbelt MD USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473 Journal Volume Volume 3 Journal Issue Volume 3, Numbers 1-2

Description:    We describe a framework designed to simplify the acquisition and integration of data from multiple, diversely formatted, geographically distributed science data sets. Our domain is Heliophysics where measurements of magnetic fields, plasmas, and charged particles are often made in-situ, with the data made available in relatively low volume data sets consisting of time series tables. Data format diversity has proven to be a significant barrier to the type of integrated, multi-mission analysis that is now very important in Heliophysics. Therefore we have developed a Java framework capable of reading, interpreting, and providing uniform access to the science content of any distributed time series data set. The framework exposes data only through fully abstract interfaces that represent data content while hiding all access details such as file format, data file granularity and access protocols. Furthermore, specialized interfaces for representing measurement-specific details are also employed, so that our framework enables data sets to be recast into scientifically interoperable representations. The context of our efforts is an increasingly distributed Heliophysics data environment that employs a collection of discipline-specific Virtual Observatories (VOs), each providing data search and retrieval services for one Heliophysics sub-discipline. Our framework is bundled in a library that ultimately will serve as a universal reader for Heliophysics data, solving the formats problem and serving as key infrastructure for advanced, science-sensitive data manipulation services. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 75-86 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0044-5 Authors Jon Vandegriff, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab 11100 Johns Hopkins Rd. Laurel MD 20723 USA Lawrence Brown, Johns Hopkins University Applied Physics Lab 11100 Johns Hopkins Rd. Laurel MD 20723 USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473 Journal Volume Volume 3 Journal Issue Volume 3, Numbers 1-2

Description:    Reuse of software and related components can contribute to the development of systems for processing scientific data. The reuse of components, which can be from any stage of the development life cycle, provides opportunities to realize benefits such as reduced costs and learning curves. However, the reuse of existing components also comes with risks that must be recognized in order to be mitigated. The National Aeronautics and Space Administration established the Earth Science Data Systems Software Reuse Working Group to support software reuse among members of the community of Earth science data systems developers. This is done through a variety of activities, including research, education, and public outreach, which are conducted to help encourage and enable reuse within the community. Considerations for realizing the benefits of software reuse and minimizing risks are presented along with recent working group activities to improve reuse capabilities for the community of Earth science data systems developers. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 95-100 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0054-3 Authors James J. Marshall, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center INNOVIM/NASA Goddard Space Flight Center Mailstop 614.9 Greenbelt MD 20771 USA Robert R. Downs, Columbia University Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN) 202 Geoscience, Lamont-Doherty Earth Obs. Palisades NY 10964 USA Shahin Samadi, INNOVIM/NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, INNOVIM 7501 Greenway Center Drive, Suite 660 Greenbelt MD 20770 USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473 Journal Volume Volume 3 Journal Issue Volume 3, Numbers 1-2

Description:    From a scientist’s viewpoint a web site is one tool used to conduct research. From an artist’s viewpoint web sites are a form of visual composition. From a developer’s point of view a web site is a type of application. While web sites are a relatively new medium with a particular set of constraints, they do adhere to the same basic design principles that apply to other art forms. These design principles are the basic assumptions that affect the arrangement of elements within a composition. A successful design uses the principles and elements to achieve a visual goal in the composition. A web site designed for scientists has unique properties which are not shared by many other types of web sites. These properties influence the overall visual design of the web sites. Recently at the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics at UCLA undertook a re-design of a number of its websites. In the effort, the use of visual design principles combined with the properties of a science web site were put to the test. In all, six different web sites were designed each with a difference science focus. We describe the process used to design the web sites which involve forming teams of designers, scientists and developers. We present example pages from each design and conclude with a discussion of what was learned during the process. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 51-57 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0058-z Authors Kica Worrilow, Kica Design Marina Del Rey CA 90292 USA Todd King, University of California Los Angeles Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics Los Angeles CA 90095 USA Raymond Walker, University of California Los Angeles Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics Los Angeles CA 90095 USA Mark E. Rose, Research Center Perot Systems Government Services, Inc (PSGS) / NASA Ames Moffett Field CA 94035-1000 USA William Moore, University of California Los Angeles Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics Los Angeles CA 90095 USA Steven Joy, University of California Los Angeles Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics Los Angeles CA 90095 USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473 Journal Volume Volume 3 Journal Issue Volume 3, Numbers 1-2

Description:    Developments in information and communication technologies offer new opportunities to use and integrate scientific data that have been collected by researchers and scholars from diverse fields of inquiry. Data archives and digital repository systems are being developed to preserve current and legacy scientific data and technical information for use by others. However, capabilities are needed for data producers of various disciplines to easily and efficiently submit their data into archival systems for preservation. Analysis of digital preservation requirements has identified the requirements for services to support the submission and review of scientific data for preservation. Data submission and review processes are segmented into services, which are defined to support efficient preparation of scientific data for ingest into an archive or digital repository system. A model is proposed to inform the design of submission and workflow services for preserving interdisciplinary scientific data. Recommendations are offered for improving the design and evaluation of systems and services to prepare and preserve scientific data for new uses by interdisciplinary communities of users in the future. Improving the infrastructure that enables members of the scientific community to submit their data for archiving contributes to the scientific data stewardship and data curation capabilities needed to preserve scientific data for future generations of users. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 101-110 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0051-6 Authors Robert R. Downs, Columbia University Center for International Earth Science Information Network 61 Route 9W Palisades NY 10964 USA Robert S. Chen, Columbia University Center for International Earth Science Information Network 61 Route 9W Palisades NY 10964 USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473 Journal Volume Volume 3 Journal Issue Volume 3, Numbers 1-2

Description:    The recent Heliophysics Virtual Observatory (VxO) effort involves the development of separate observatories with a low overlap in physical domain or area of scientific specialization and a high degree of overlap in metadata management needs. VxOware is a content and metadata management system. While it is intended for use by a VxO specifically, it can also be used by any entity that manages structured metadata. VxOware has many features of a content management system and extensively uses the W3C recommendations for XML (Extensible Markup Language), XQuery (XML Query), and XSLT (Extensible Style Sheet Language Transformations). VxOware has features such as system and user administration, search, user-editable content, version tracking, and a wiki. Besides virtual observatories, the intended user-base of VxOware includes a group or an instrument team that has developed a directory structure of data files and would like to make this data, and its associated metadata, available in the virtual observatory network. One of the most powerful features of VxOware is the ability to link any type of object in the observatory to other objects and the ability for every object to be tagged. Content Type Journal Article Category Software Article Pages 19-28 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0048-1 Authors Robert S. Weigel, George Mason University 4400 University Drive Fairfax VA 22030 USA Mikhail Zhizhin, Geophysical Center Russian Academy of Sciences Molodezhnaya Str., 3 Moscow 119296 Russia Dmitry Mishin, Geophysical Center Russian Academy of Sciences Molodezhnaya Str., 3 Moscow 119296 Russia Dmitry Kokovin, Geophysical Center Russian Academy of Sciences Molodezhnaya Str., 3 Moscow 119296 Russia Eric Kihn, National Geophysical Data Center E/GC 325 Broadway Boulder CO 80305-3328 USA Jeremy Faden, Cottage Systems 1141 E. Court St. Iowa City IA 52240 USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473 Journal Volume Volume 3 Journal Issue Volume 3, Numbers 1-2

Description:    Each year destructive events might cause loss of data in members of an archival federation. This paper provides a ‘back-of-the-envelope’ model for the fraction of the federated data collection that survives after a certain number of years. It also discusses some simple parameterizations of factors that contribute to the trade offs between cost and survival of information. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-5 DOI 10.1007/s12145-012-0100-4 Authors Bruce R. Barkstrom, 15 Josie Lane, Asheville, NC, USA Chris A. Mattmann, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    GIS and Remote Sensing have proved to be an indispensible tool in morphometric analysis. The identification of morphometric properties based on a geographic information system (GIS) was carried out in two watersheds in the Thrissur district of Kerala, India. These watersheds are parts of Western Ghats, which is an ecologically sensitive area. Quantitative geomorphometric analysis was carried out for the Chimmini and Mupily watersheds independently by estimating their (a) linear aspects like stream number, stream order, stream length, mean stream length, stream length ratio, bifurcation ratio, length of overland flow, drainage pattern (b) aerial aspects like circulatory ratio, elongation ratio, drainage density and (c) relief aspects like basin relief, relief ratio, relative relief and ruggedness number. The drainage areas of Chimmini and Mupily watersheds are 140 and 122 km 2 respectively and show patterns of dendritic to sub-dendritic drainage. The Chimmini watershed was classified as a sixth order drainage basin, whereas Mupily watershed was classified as a fifth order basin. The stream order of the basin was predominantly controlled by physiographic and structural conditions. The increase in the stream length ratio from lower to higher order suggests that the study area has reached a mature geomorphic stage. The development of stream segments is affected by rainfall and local lithology of the watersheds. The slope of both watersheds varied from 0° to 50° and 0° to 42° respectively and the slope variation is chiefly controlled by the local geology and erosion cycles. Moreover, these studies are useful for planning rain water harvesting and watershed management. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-11 DOI 10.1007/s12145-012-0101-3 Authors N. S. Magesh, Centre for Geotechnology, Manonmaniam Sundaranar University, Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu, India 627012 K. V. Jitheshlal, Centre for Geotechnology, Manonmaniam Sundaranar University, Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu, India 627012 N. Chandrasekar, Centre for Geotechnology, Manonmaniam Sundaranar University, Tirunelveli, Tamil Nadu, India 627012 K. V. Jini, Department of Geology and Environmental Science, Christ College, Irinjalakuda, Thrissur, Kerala, India 680125 Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    Isostatic hypotheses are used for different purposes in geophysics and geodesy. The Erath crustal thickness modelling is more complicated than the classical isostatic models. In this study we try to modify Airy-Hesiskanen model, utilizing a smoothing factor, to a model with regional or global isostatic model through a modern solution of the gravimetric-isostatic Vening Meinesz model and CRUST.0. In Airy-Hesiskanen’s theory there is no correlation between neighbouring crustal columns, while this must be the case in reality due to the elasticity of the Earth. The idea is to keep the simplicity of the Airy-Heiskanen model, because it needs only the topographic data, and change the model which becomes to a model with regional/global isostatic model. The isostatic assumption for compensating the topographic potential is incomplete, as there are other geophysical phenomena which should be considered. Using the isostatic hypothesis for determining the depth of crust causes some disturbing signals in the gravity anomaly (approximately 285 mGal), which influence the crustal thickness determination. In this paper a simple method use for removing these effects. Spherical harmonic potential coefficients of the topographic compensation masses are used for modifying Airy-Heiskanen’s model in a least-square adjustment procedure by estimating smoothing factor. The numerical analysis shows that below degree 10, the modified Airy-Hesiskanen and Vening Meinesz models are close together. Smoothing factors for modifying the Airy-Hesiskanen model vary from 0.75 to 0.64 between degrees 200 and 2159. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-12 DOI 10.1007/s12145-012-0099-6 Authors Mohammad Bagherbandi, Division of Geodesy and Geoinformatics, Royal Institute of Technology (KTH), SE-10044 Stockholm, Sweden Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    We present a method to estimate the difference between quasigeoid and geoid heights globally from the Earth Gravitational Model EGM08 and a related topographic model. The numerical computations with the standard topographic density of 2.67 g/cm 3 show that the maximum and minimum of the separations are estimated to 5.47 m and −0.11 m on the Tibet plateau and in the Indian Ocean, respectively. These estimates do not consider possible topographic density variations, which result in topographic bias changes proportional to the topographic elevation squared. Assuming such density changes of 10% from the standard value, the separation may change up to 5 dm. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-5 DOI 10.1007/s12145-012-0098-7 Authors L. E. Sjöberg, Division of Geodesy and Geoinformatics, Royal Institute of Technology, SE-100 44 Stockholm, Sweden M. Bagherbandi, Division of Geodesy and Geoinformatics, Royal Institute of Technology, SE-100 44 Stockholm, Sweden Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    The DigitalOcean (DO) Project is designed to bring essential Web 2.0 capabilities to an open-source software platform built for scientific collaboration and publishing. The DO platform is being built using the Drupal content management system (CMS). The following are some of the core features of the proposed platform: social networking, media/data sharing/publishing, and collaboration spaces for scientific virtual organizations (VO); active support for VO governance and reputation systems for members and objects; Creative Commons licensing, support for preprint archives and micro-articles, and; professional user-profiles that can be saved as well formatted biosketches. The DO platform serves as a collaboration environment for active research teams, a personal repository for individual researchers, an aggregation/filter for science information, and a scientific publishing tool. This article will outline the history and goals of the DO Project, the core technology concerns and solutions, and the opportunities that this new platform will bring to scientists across the planet. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-6 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0090-7 Authors Bruce Caron, New Media Research Institute, Santa Barbara, CA, USA Dave Toole, Outhink, Inc, San Mateo, CA, USA Paul Wicks, San Francisco, CA, USA Steve Miller, Bren School of Environmental Science & Management, University of California, Santa Barbara, USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    With the rapid development of the World Wide Web, remote sensing (RS) data have become available to a wider range of public/professional users than ever before. Web Map Services (WMSs) provide a simple Web interface for requesting RS data from distributed geospatial databases. RS data providers typically expect to provide lightweight WMSs. They have a low construction cost, and can be easily managed and deployed on standard hardware/software platforms. However, existing systems for WMSs are often heavyweight and inherently hard to manage, due to their improper usage of databases or data storage. That is, they are not suitable for public data services on the Web. In addition, RS data are moving toward the multi-dimensional paradigm, which is characterized by multi-sensor, multi-spectral, multi-temporal and high resolution. Therefore, an efficient organization and storage approach of multi-dimensional RS data is needed for lightweight WMSs, and the efficient WMSs must support multi-dimensional Web browsing. In this paper, we propose a Global Remote Sensing Data Hierarchical Model (GRHM) based on the image pyramid and tiling techniques. GRHM is a logical model that is independent upon physical storage. To support lightweight WMSs, we propose a physical storage structure, and deploy multi-dimensional RS data on Web servers. To further improve the performance of WMSs, a data declustering method based on Hilbert space-filling curve is adopted for the distributed storage. We also provide an Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC) WMS and a Web map system in Web browsers. Experiments conducted on real RS datasets show promising performance of the proposed lightweight WMSs. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-15 DOI 10.1007/s12145-012-0096-9 Authors Yongwang Zhao, National Laboratory of Software Development Environment, School of Computer Science and Engineering, Beihang University, Haidian District, Beijing, China Chunyang Hu, AVIC Aerospace Life-Support Industries, LTD., NO.29, Xinhua Road, Xiangyang, Hubei, China Hualei Shen, National Laboratory of Software Development Environment, School of Computer Science and Engineering, Beihang University, Haidian District, Beijing, China Dianfu Ma, National Laboratory of Software Development Environment, School of Computer Science and Engineering, Beihang University, Haidian District, Beijing, China Xuan Li, Communication Satellite Division, Chinese Academy of Space Technology, Haidian District, Beijing, China Yonggang Huang, National Laboratory of Software Development Environment, School of Computer Science and Engineering, Beihang University, Haidian District, Beijing, China Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    “Open science,” where researchers share and publish every element of their research process in addition to the final results, can foster novel ways of collaboration among researchers and has the potential to spontaneously create new virtual research collaborations. Based on scientific interest, these new virtual research collaborations can cut across traditional boundaries such as institutions and organizations. Advances in technology allow for software tools that can be used by different research groups and institutions to build and support virtual collaborations and infuse open science. This paper describes Talkoot, a software toolkit designed and developed by the authors to provide Earth Science researchers a ready-to-use knowledge management environment and an online platform for collaboration. Talkoot allows Earth Science researchers a means to systematically gather, tag and share their data, analysis workflows and research notes. These Talkoot features are designed to foster rapid knowledge sharing within a virtual community. Talkoot can be utilized by small to medium sized groups and research centers, as well as large enterprises such a national laboratories and federal agencies. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-9 DOI 10.1007/s12145-012-0094-y Authors Rahul Ramachandran, University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, AL, USA Manil Maskey, University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, AL, USA Ajinkya Kulkarni, University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, AL, USA Helen Conover, University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, AL, USA U. S. Nair, University of Alabama in Huntsville, Huntsville, AL, USA Sunil Movva, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, TN, USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    The Arctic is changing rapidly with dramatic local and global effect. To understand that change requires understanding the Arctic as a system. Models of different processes and at various scales are necessary tools for analyzing and understanding the Earth system. Models are extremely diverse, yet they all require quality data. Through a series of case studies, augmented with ethnographic observation around the International Polar Year, this work examines how modelers assess, acquire, and prepare data for their models. By comparing specific case studies, common themes emerge that can be compared against broader observation. These themes, in turn, suggest data management techniques or requirements for data systems to improve access and use by modelers and generally improve understanding of the Arctic system. The study has an Arctic focus because of the rapid changes occurring in the Arctic, but the approach and results should apply generally to Earth system science. This case study based approach has proven to be a useful method for teasing out both general and specific data needs for different models. An overarching lesson is that greater short-term benefit to modelers and significant gains in efficiency can be achieved by improving the formats, convention, and consistency of the data rather than improved interfaces and analysis tools. A “data-first” philosophy can improve the data systems that support the overall interdisciplinary, integrative science necessary to understand the complex Earth system. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-27 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0089-0 Authors Mark A. Parsons, National Snow and Ice Data Center, University of Colorado, UCB449, Boulder, CO 80309-0449, USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    Web interfaces have made remote sensing image resources more accessible and interactive. However, many web-based and Digital Earth opportunities for remote sensing have not yet been fully explored and could greatly facilitate scientific collaboration. In many cases, these resources can augment traditional proprietary software packages, which can have limited flexibility, spatiotemporal controls, and data synthesis abilities. In this paper, we discuss how web services and Google Earth were used for time-critical geovisualizations of the NASA Airborne Visible/Infrared Imaging Spectrometer (AVIRIS) Deepwater Horizon oil spill imaging campaign. In particular, we describe how (1) AVIRIS Google Earth products were used to visualize the spatial and temporal characteristics of the campaign’s image acquisitions, critically needed for flight planning, (2) the Google Fusion Table cloud-based service was applied to create a highly-interactive image archive and mapping display, and (3) the Google Fusion Table API was utilized to create a flexible PHP-based interface for metadata creation and as the basis for an interactive data catalog. Although there are other possible software and programming approaches to these activities, we highlight freely-accessible and flexible solutions and bring attention to the newly introduced Google Fusion Tables as a collaborative scientific platform. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-11 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0085-4 Authors Eliza S. Bradley, Department of Geography, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA Dar A. Roberts, Department of Geography, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA Philip E. Dennison, Department of Geography and Center for Natural and Technological Hazards, University of Utah, Salt Lake City, UT 84112, USA Robert O. Green, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91109, USA Michael Eastwood, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91109, USA Sarah R. Lundeen, Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA 91109, USA Ian B. McCubbin, Desert Research Institute, Storm Peak Laboratory, Steamboat Springs, CO 80488, USA Ira Leifer, Marine Science Institute, University of California Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106, USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    The online Dynamic Weather Forecaster is an open, collaborative application available now to high-school and college instructors across the United States who would like to easily incorporate weather forecasting in their instruction. The application consists of a set of 13 questions that allow students to submit forecasts that cover most of the parameters used by professional weather forecasters. Submissions are automatically validated against weather parameters and graded. We tested the impact of the application on the learning of 199 undergraduate students in an introductory meteorology course in spring 2008. Students who begin forecasting early in the semester and continue to do so throughout the semester are statistically significantly more successful in the course than students who start late or complete a low number of forecasts. College, year in school, and gender were not significant predictors of success. Students found the application easy to use, and 92.3% of them found it at least somewhat helpful as they learned about the weather. Through the use of the DWF, students also experience first-hand that uncertainty is a critical part of weather forecasting and of scientific studies in general. With sufficient interest from potential users outside the USA, the DWF platform could easily be expanded to include global weather data. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-9 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0087-2 Authors Cinzia Cervato, Department of Geological and Atmospheric Sciences, Iowa State University, Ames, IA 50011, USA William Gallus, Department of Geological and Atmospheric Sciences, Iowa State University, Ames, IA 50011, USA Pete Boysen, IT Services Academic Technologies, Iowa State University, Ames, IA 50011, USA Michael Larsen, Biostatistics Center and Dept of Statistics, George Washington University, Rockville, MD 20852, USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    Reducing uncertainty in global temperature reconstructions of the past millennium remains the key issue in applying this record to society’s pressing climate change problem. Reconstructions are collaborative, built on the research of hundreds of scientists who apply their diverse scientific expertise and field and laboratory skill to create the individual proxy reconstructions that underlie the multi-proxy, global average temperature time series. Web 2.0 features have enabled collaborative efforts that improve the characterization of uncertainty. Raw data shared via a repository (the World Data Center for Paleoclimatology) enable new reconstructions from the collection of user-generated data. Standards propagated by expert communities facilitate quality control and interoperability. Open access to data and computer code promote transparency and make the science accessible to a broader audience. Blogs, wikis, and listservs share background information and highlight contentious as well as unique aspects of paleo science. A novel approach now underway, titled the Paleoclimate Reconstruction Challenge, and based on the sharing of simulated data (pseudo-proxies) and reconstruction results, seeks to facilitate method development, further reducing uncertainty. Broadly-useful aspects of the Challenge may find application in other fields. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-7 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0086-3 Authors David Morrill Anderson, NOAA Paleoclimatology, NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center, Boulder, CO, USA Bruce A. Bauer, NOAA Paleoclimatology, NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center, Boulder, CO, USA Charles R. Buckner, NOAA Paleoclimatology, NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center, Boulder, CO, USA Edward Gille, NOAA Paleoclimatology, NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center, Boulder, CO, USA Wendy S. Gross, NOAA Paleoclimatology, NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center, Boulder, CO, USA Michael Hartman, NOAA Paleoclimatology, NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center, Boulder, CO, USA Carrie Morrill, NOAA Paleoclimatology, NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center, Boulder, CO, USA Anju M. Shah, NOAA Paleoclimatology, NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center, Boulder, CO, USA Eugene R. Wahl, NOAA Paleoclimatology, NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center, Boulder, CO, USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    The retrieval of spatial resources is typically hindered by the lack of exhaustive metadata, linguistic issues, multilingualism, and domain-related terminology mismatches. This paper describes an experimental attempt to set up a knowledge base that will serve as groundwork for harmonising domain knowledge from distinct thematic areas, to enable the semantics-aware annotation of resources, and to support the implementation of novel discovery techniques. Setting this up also required establishing a general work flow for translating ISO-compliant registries into SKOS/RDF data structures and enriching them with structural information. These steps are also presented. The validity of the approach is then evaluated by analysing various applications’ exploitation of the knowledge base in diverse use cases. Content Type Journal Article Category Methodology Article Pages 1-15 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0088-1 Authors Cristiano Fugazza, Spatial Data Infrastructures Unit, Institute for Environment and Sustainability – Joint Research Centre (JRC-IES), via E. Fermi, 2749 Ispra (VA), Italy Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    Collaborative eScience research teams are impeded by difficulties defining problems that provide research opportunities for all participants. Problem formulation occurs early in the collaboration process when the demand for ideas is high. However, cross-disciplinary linkages and integrated conceptual frameworks from which strong interdisciplinary ideas emerge do not evolve until later. The process of co-creating interdisciplinary research ideas is fundamentally a learning problem; participants from different disciplines must learn enough about each other’s research interests to construct an integrated conceptual framework from which joint problems of interest can be created. However, participants rarely have the conceptual background needed to easily understand research topics in other disciplines; hence methods for enabling rapid learning in these situations are needed. Team interactions that more effectively generate interdisciplinary ideas can be enabled based on a better understanding the process of cross-disciplinary, collaborative learning. This article postulates several models of collaborative learning in these settings and discusses the implications for orchestrating team activities to achieve better outcomes. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-14 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0077-4 Authors Deana D. Pennington, University of Texas at El Paso, Cyber-ShARE Center, CLB C401, El Paso, TX 79968, USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    This paper presents the use of the Low Memory Locality Sensitive Hashing (LMLSH) technique operating in Euclidean space to build a data structure for the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program (DMSP) satellite imagery database. The LMLSH technique finds satellite image matches in sublinear search time. The texture feature vectors of the images are extracted using pyramid-structured wavelet transform coupled with Gaussian central moment technique. These feature vectors and families of hash functions, drawn randomly and independently from a Gaussian distribution, are used to build hash tables. Given a query, the hash tables are used to pull out the best matches to that query and this is done in a sublinear search time complexity. When tested, our algorithm has proven to be approximately twenty six times faster than the Linear Search (LS) algorithm. In addition, the LMLSH algorithm searches about two percent of the entire database randomly to find the possible matches to any given query without loss of accuracy compared to the absolute best matches returned by its LS counterpart. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-12 DOI 10.1007/s12145-010-0076-x Authors Ruben Buaba, Autonomous Control and Information Technology Center, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Greensboro, NC 27411, USA Abdollah Homaifar, Autonomous Control and Information Technology Center, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Greensboro, NC 27411, USA Mohamed Gebril, Autonomous Control and Information Technology Center, Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, Greensboro, NC 27411, USA Eric Kihn, NOAA/NGDC, 325 Broadway, Boulder, CO 80305, USA Mikhail Zhizhin, Russian Academy of Science CGDS, Moscow, Russia Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    In recent years, a number of data identification technologies have been developed which purport to permanently identify digital objects. In this paper, nine technologies and systems for assigning persistent identifiers are assessed for their applicability to Earth science data (ARKs, DOIs, XRIs, Handles, LSIDs, OIDs, PURLs, URIs/URNs/URLs, and UUIDs). The evaluation used four use cases that focused on the suitability of each scheme to provide Unique Identifiers for Earth science data objects, to provide Unique Locators for the objects, to serve as Citable Locators, and to uniquely identify the scientific contents of data objects if the data were reformatted. Of all the identifier schemes assessed, the one that most closely meets all of the requirements for an Unique Identifier is the UUID scheme. Any of the URL/URI/IRI-based identifier schemes assessed could be used for Unique Locators. Since there are currently no strong market leaders to help make the choice among them, the decision must be based on secondary criteria. While most publications now allow the use of URLs in citations, so that all of the URL/URI/IRI based identification schemes discussed in this paper could potentially be used as a Citable Locator, DOIs are the identification scheme currently adopted by most commercial publishers. None of the identifier schemes assessed here even minimally address identification of scientifically identical numerical data sets under reformatting. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-22 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0083-6 Authors Ruth E. Duerr, National Snow and Ice Data Center, University of Colorado at Boulder, Boulder, CO 80309-0449, USA Robert R. Downs, Center for International Earth Science Information Network (CIESIN), Columbia University, 202 Geoscience, Lamont-Doherty Earth Obs., Palisades, NY 10964, USA Curt Tilmes, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD 20771, USA Bruce Barkstrom, NASA/NOAA, Asheville, NC 28804, USA W. Christopher Lenhardt, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, TN, USA Joseph Glassy, R&D, Lupine Logic Inc., 1121 East Broadway St, Suite 128, Missoula, MT 59802, USA Luis E. Bermudez, Open Geospatial Consortium (OGC), 483B Carlisle Drive, Herndon, VA 20170, USA Peter Slaughter, Earth Research Institute, University of California at Santa Barbara, Santa Barbara, CA 93106-3060, USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    Remote sensing data from satellites have provided valuable information on the state of the earth for several decades. Since March 2000, the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) sensor on board NASA’s Terra and Aqua satellites have been providing estimates of several land parameters useful in understanding earth system processes at global, continental, and regional scales. However, the HDF-EOS file format, specialized software needed to process the HDF-EOS files, data volume, and the high spatial and temporal resolution of MODIS data make it difficult for users wanting to extract small but valuable amounts of information from the MODIS record. To overcome this usability issue, the NASA-funded Distributed Active Archive Center (DAAC) for Biogeochemical Dynamics at Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) developed a Web service that provides subsets of MODIS land products using Simple Object Access Protocol (SOAP). The ORNL DAAC MODIS subsetting Web service is a standard based way of serving satellite data that exploits a fairly established and popular Internet protocol to allow users access to massive amounts of remote sensing data. The Web service provides MODIS land product subsets up to 201 × 201 km in a non-proprietary comma delimited text file format. Users can programmatically query the Web service to extract MODIS land parameters for real time data integration into models, decision support tools or connect to workflow software. Information regarding the MODIS SOAP subsetting Web service is available on the World Wide Web (WWW) at http://daac.ornl.gov/modiswebservice . Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-10 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0079-2 Authors Suresh K. Santhana Vannan, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, P.O. Box 2008, MS 6301, Oak Ridge, TN 37831, USA Robert B. Cook, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, P.O. Box 2008, MS 6301, Oak Ridge, TN 37831, USA Jerry Y. Pan, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, P.O. Box 2008, MS 6301, Oak Ridge, TN 37831, USA Bruce E. Wilson, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, P.O. Box 2008, MS 6301, Oak Ridge, TN 37831, USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    Risk assessment and management, are increasingly established as key procedures in dealing with the range of environmental issues at different scales and of different nature. Although at the EU and international policy level requirements for the use of risk assessment and management are being established through emerging policy and legislation, this demand has not been followed with common guidance on how to do so. This has proven to hinder the effective adoption of such processes, and posed a barrier more so in its implementation for large transboundary issues. In this paper is presented a Decision Support System (DSS) designed to provide a common framework and procedure for environmental risk assessment and management. The DSS is web-based and was developed to enable the formalized and more systematic utilization of risk assessment and management procedures in environmental decision making processes, in particular for users such as public authority officials charged with the responsibility of implementing risk management legal and policy obligations, yet which have limited know how in the field of risk. The DSS presented herein enables environmental administrators and decision makers to undertake generic risk assessment and management identifying areas where detailed risk assessment is required, proposing as well as appropriate risk management options. The web DSS was developed and piloted as part of the STRiM project funded by the European Union. Herein are shown results from the web application which has been trailed successfully in four pilot trials addressing risks of forest damage from storms, water pollution from olive mill waste discharges, wetland loss from water abstraction, and damage from flooding. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-9 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0081-8 Authors K. Pediaditi, Department of Environmental Management, Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Chania, Alsylion Agrokepion, Chania, P.O.Box 185, 73100 Crete, Greece M. Stanojevic, Mihailo Pupin Institute, Volgina 15, 11060 Belgrade, Serbia C. Kouskouna, Faculty of Law, University of Athens (EKPA), Athens, Greece M. Karydas, Department of Environmental Management, Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Chania, Alsylion Agrokepion, Chania, P.O.Box 185, 73100 Crete, Greece D. Zianis, Department of Environmental Management, Mediterranean Agronomic Institute of Chania, Alsylion Agrokepion, Chania, P.O.Box 185, 73100 Crete, Greece George P. Petropoulos, Department of Earth Sciences, University of Bristol, Queens Road, Bristol, BS8 1RJ UK N. Boretos, Department of Information Systems and Technology, Mediterranean Agronomic Institute Chania, Alsyllion Agrokepion, Chania, Crete 73100, Greece Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description: Scientists in the Earth and Environmental Sciences (EES) domain increasingly use ontologies to analyze and integrate their data. For example, the NASA’s SWEET ontologies (Semantic Web for Earth and Environmental Terminology) have become the de facto standard ontologies to represent the EES domain formally (Raskin 2010 ). Now we must develop principled ways both to evaluate existing ontologies and to ascertain their quality in a quantitative manner. Existing literature describes many potential quality metrics for ontologies. Among these metrics is the coverage metric, which approximates the relevancy of an ontology to a corpus (Yao et al. (PLoS Comput Biol 7(1):e1001055+, 2011 )). This paper has three primary contributions to the EES domain: (1) we present an investigation of the applicability of existing coverage techniques for the EES domain; (2) we present a novel expansion of existing techniques that uses thesauri to generate equivalence and subclass axioms automatically; and (3) we present an experiment to establish an upper-bound coverage expectation for the SWEET ontologies against real-world EES corpora from DataONE (Michener et al. (Ecol Inform 11:5–15, 2012 )), and a corpus designed from research articles to specifically match the topics covered by the SWEET ontologies. This initial evaluation suggests that the SWEET ontology can accurately represent real corpora within the EES domain.

Description: This study investigates the effect of discrete wavelet transform data pre-processing method on neural network-based successive-station monthly streamflow prediction models. For this aim, using data from two successive gauging stations on Çoruh River, Turkey, we initially developed eight different single-step-ahead neural monthly streamflow prediction models. Typical three-layer feed-forward (FFNN) topology, trained with Levenberg-Marquardt (LM) algorithm, has been employed to develop the best structure of each model. Then, the input time series of each model were decomposed into subseries at different resolution modes using Daubechies (db4) wavelet function. At the next step, eight hybrid neuro-wavelet (NW) models were generated using the subseries of each model. Ultimately, root mean square error and Nash-Sutcliffe efficiency measures have been used to compare the performance of both FFNN and NW models. The results indicated that the successive-station prediction strategy using a pair of upstream-downstream records tends to decrease the lagged prediction effect of single-station runoff-runoff models. Higher performances of NW models compared to those of FFNN in all combinations demonstrated that the db4 wavelet transform function is a powerful tool to capture the non-stationary feature of the successive-station streamflow process. The comparative performance analysis among different combinations showed that the highest improvement for FFNN occurs when simultaneous lag-time is considered for both stations.

Description: This paper describes the development of visual basic program called ‘Linfo’ which can be used for calculation of spatial properties (orientation, length, density, frequency and intersection density) of lineaments. The program allows the user to analyze the orientation of lineaments easily and shows the results in the form of rose diagram. Linfo can handle large number of lineaments at a time and calculates the results faster than any other software. Linfo generates regular square grids over lineament data and calculates the number, length and intersections of lineaments that fall within each cell. The program is validated with lineament data of Kerala state, India and prepared the spatial maps using Inverse Distance Weighted (IDW) interpolation method. The experimental results show that Linfo is useful for generating spatial maps using any interpolation method. Potential application of the program includes demarcation of groundwater potential zones, landslide risk assessment etc.

Description: The voltage stability problem in long-distance transmission systems can be exacerbated by geomagnetic disturbance (GMD) even in middle and low latitude areas where the effects of GMDs are considered to be mild compared to auroral areas. With the high voltage and the long-distance transmission lines, power system in China has to face the voltage instability risk. To clarify and measure the risk from GMD represented by geoelectric field, method for analysis of relationship between voltage stability of the long-distance transmission system and the size and direction of geoelectric field is provided. On the basis of calculation for geomagnetically induced currents (GICs) of power system and the additional reactive power losses of transformer due to GIC, the model of long-distance transmission line affected by geoelectric field is established. To measure the impact on the voltage stability of power system and the sensitivity of voltage to geoelectric field, the voltage stability index and the set of voltage limit violation nodes are proposed and calculated considering different geoelectric field and different initial operation conditions of power system. By taking the Northwest 750 kV power system in China as an example, voltage stability with geoelectric field magnitude from 1 V/km to 10 V/km, direction (0°) from north to south (180°) is analyzed and the voltage stability index is calculated, and the set of voltage limit violation nodes are summarized as well. The results show that the method is feasible and the index can reflect actually the relationship between the long-distance transmission system voltage stability and the geoelectric field, and the set of the voltage limit violation nodes can indicate which nodes are most susceptible to GMD.

Description: The strength of anisotropic rock masses can be evaluated through either theoretical or experimental methods. The latter is more precise but also more expensive and time-consuming especially due to difficulties of preparing high-quality samples. Numerical methods, such as finite element method (FEM), finite difference method (FDM), distinct element method (DEM), etc. have been regarded as precise and low-cost theoretical approaches in different fields of rock engineering. On the other hand, applicability of intelligent approaches such as fuzzy systems, neural networks and decision trees in rock mechanics problems has been recognized through numerous published papers. In current study, it is aimed to theoretically evaluate the strength of anisotropic rocks with through-going discontinuity using numerical and intelligent methods. In order to do this, first, strength data of such rocks are collected from the literature. Then FlAC, a commercially well-known software for FDM analysis, is applied to simulate the situation of triaxial test on anisotropic jointed specimens. Reliability of this simulation in predicting the strength of jointed specimens has been verified by previous researches. Therefore, the few gaps of the experimental data are filled by numerical simulation to prevent unexpected learning errors. Furthermore, a sensitivity analysis is carried out based on the numerical process applied herein. Finally, two intelligent methods namely feed forward neural network and a newly developed fuzzy modeling approach are utilized to predict the strength of above-mentioned specimens. Comparison of the results with experimental data demonstrates that the intelligent models result in desirable prediction accuracy.

Description: As large quantities of physical data are always collected for Ecoinformatics research, it is difficult for them to be cleaned, shared, visualized, and analyzed by research collaborators. To resolve this difficulty, this study presents online weather data analysis and visualization cyber-infrastructures consisting of (1) online weather data analysis and visualization tools and (2) near real-time online weather data portal. Firstly, these online tools at www.twibl.org/weather provide data sharing in three web pages: information on instruments and site; data access protected by simple password security; data analysis and visualization services so-called “Ecoinfows”. Secondly, the near real-time online weather data portal for visualizing and forecasting weather data from cloud storage of many automatic weather stations is online at www.twibl.org/aaportal . To overcome speed and accessibility problems, we developed these tools with many technologies - i.e. cloud computing, online computing XML ( webMathematica ), and binary access data conversion.

Description: Although the research and application of a geographic information system (GIS) in bibliometrics remains in its initial stage, several valuable attempts have been made in recent years. This paper provides our overview regarding this area. We first reviewed the spatial information mining derived from literature, including structured and unstructured data. The spatial display and the basic spatial operations for the geographic information derived from literature were then introduced, demonstrating that GIS can be directly used to construct digital libraries. Some literature database websites have begun to utilize WEBGIS to display the spatial distribution of an author’s location. Additionally, the spatial distribution information can be displayed in various modes with other specialized tools. Potential spatial analyses in bibliometrics were then discussed, introducing geostatistical and buffer analyses as case studies. Finally, several bibliometric indicators attached with research units were investigated. When the quantitative research index units are linked with the research spatial position, they can be displayed, queried and retrieved spatially. Future work to advance the application and research of GIS in bibliometrics is still warranted.

Description: Slope information is usually derived from digital elevation model (DEM) data. However, the orientation of DEM grids can affect the accuracy of slope estimation, which will in turn have an influence on the accuracy of other derived information based on slope. This research evaluates six commonly used algorithms for slope estimation: the second-order finite difference, the third-order finite difference, the third-order finite difference weighted by reciprocal of squared distance, the third-order finite difference weighted by reciprocal of distance and the frame finite difference and the simple difference. With synthetic data and systematic experiments by rotating DEM grids, the accuracy of the algorithms was analysed, empirically and theoretically. The main findings are as follows. When the DEM resolution is constant and one of first five algorithms is used, the error of slope calculation caused by orientation can be described by a sine function with a minimal positive period of π/2. For the last algorithm, i.e., the frame finite difference, the error of slope calculation could not be described by any periodic function. These theoretical error quantification functions were tested and verified using synthetic data sets based on six different Gaussian surfaces. The root mean square error of slope calculation by the first five algorithms can also be described by a sine function with a minimal positive period of π/4. The study also shows that the accuracy of the theoretical conclusions can be guaranteed when the expressions are expanded to the third-order by using the Taylor formula.

Description: We compile the harmonic coefficients, which describe the Earth’s crustal density structure with a spectral resolution complete to degree/order 180. These coefficients can be used in gravimetric studies of the Earth’s lithosphere structure, isostasy, crustal loading, sedimentary basins and related topics. The crustal structure of the Earth’s Spectral Crustal Model 180 (ESCM180) is separated into 9 individual layers of the topography, bathymetry, polar ice sheets, sediments (3-layers) and consolidated crust (3-layers). The harmonic coefficients describe uniformly the geometry and density (or density contrast) distribution within each individual crustal component. The topographic and bathymetric coefficients are generated from the topographic/bathymetric model ETOPO1 and the global geoid model GOCO03s. A uniform density model is adopted for the topography. The ocean density distribution is approximated by the depth-dependent seawater density model. The ETOPO1 topographic and the DTM2006.0 ice thickness data are used to generate the ice coefficients, while assuming a uniform density of the glacial ice. The geometry and density distribution within sediments is described by the 3 stratigraphic layers of a laterally varying density model, and the same structure is used to describe the density distribution within the consolidated crust down to the Moho interface. The sediment and consolidated crust coefficients are generated from the global crustal model CRUST1.0. The density contrasts of the ocean, ice, sediments and remaining crustal structures are taken relative to the reference crustal density.

Description: As the characterization of primary productivity of wetland ecosystem, the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI) plays an important role in local ecosystem conservation for environmental management. In this paper, the correlations of NDVI and hydro-meteorological variables were studied in a water scarce area with emphasis on different land use types, namely water, wetland, residential land and farmland, during the growing seasons of 1999 and 2000. The significant NDVI changes were detected between spring and summer for all land use types. The correlation analysis revealed that the NDVI-temperature correlation ( P  〈 0.001) was stronger than NDVI-precipitation correlation ( P  〈 0.01 for farmland and P  〈 0.05 for others) in all land use types. In addition, water level had no significant correlation with NDVI at such a small time scale. The sensitivity differences in different land use types based on the determination coefficient of the linear regression models are: R farmland 〉 R wetland 〉 R residential land 〉 R water for NDVI and precipitation correlations ( P  〈 0.05); and R water 〉 R wetland 〉 R residential land 〉 R farmland for NDVI and temperature correlations ( P  〈 0.001). The results would be valuable for the understandings of effects of hydro-meteorological variables on NDVI changes, as well as the potential effect on land use and land cover.

Description: A few limnological studies have attempted to combine wavelet denoising, time- and space-series data, and regression models for the purposes of reliable predictions and reconstructions of time-space variations. This study was focused on median and linear regression models of saturated dissolved oxygen (DO sat ) after denoising by using discrete wavelet transform (DWT) with Chui-Wang B-spline and Coiflet wavelets and was based on remotely and proximally sensed noisy time series during 144 days. The aim was to explore effects on predictive accuracies of (1) applying multiple median or linear regression models after DWT denoising with the orthogonal Coiflet or the semiorthogonal Chui-Wang B-spline to proximally and remotely sensed noisy data, (2) adding spatial heterogeneity, and (3) including more explanatory variables. Multiple linear regression (MLR) models after DWT denoising with Chui-Wang B-spline performed better in elucidating spatiotemporal DO sat dynamics than median regressions and MLR models denoised with Coiflet. The best agreement between measured and predicted values based on an independent validation dataset was obtained by a median regression model and by a MLR model after DWT denoising with Chui-Wang B-spline for spatially homogeneous or heterogeneous DO sat estimates, respectively. Spatiotemporally increased predictive capabilities of the wavelet-augmented regression models can yield more realistic estimates, thus further bridging the gap between public policies and environmental models in the process of decision-making.

Description: In this article, by using AHP-TOPSIS technique we propose a new method for mineral potential mapping that commonly used to other science. AHP and TOPSIS are practical and useful techniques respectively for determining the relative importance of the criteria and ranking - selection of a number of externally determined alternatives through distance measures. AHP method employed to determine the importance weights of evaluation criteria, then TOPSIS technique use for selection and ranking of study area. We used AHP-TOPSIS and GIS to provid potential maps for porphyry copper mineralization on the basis of criteria derived from geological and geochemical controls, and remote sensing data including alterations and faults in Siahrud area in North West Iran. The results demonstrate the acceptable outcomes for copper porphyry exploration.

Description: Ubiquitous positioning technology is a term coined to address the requirements of specifying the “whereness” completely. The technology comprises the indoor and outdoor positioning systems. The Global Navigation Satellite System (GNSS) based systems like GPS, GLONASS, Galileo and QZSS are some of the systems that provide outdoor positioning. While Indoor Positioning Systems (IPSs) are undergoing rapid development, the systems can be supplied using short range wireless technologies such as Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, RFID, and Infrared. Wi-Fi based positioning systems are being particularly intensely researched because of their ubiquitous presence. In this paper, position determination in a 3D indoor environment is explored using the Received Signal Strength Indication (RSSI) as an input to multi-layer feed forward-back propagation artificial neural networks (ANNs), which are then integrated with GNSS to create a Ubiquitous Positioning System (UPS). The paired ANN model, an enhanced data collection method, and the architecture of the UPS are also presented in this paper, where the UPS was thoroughly investigated on a real Wi-Fi network. The result showed that the paired ANN attains a 30 % increase in accuracy compared to a single ANN, while the UPS shows a mean distance error of 3.5 m.

Description: This investigation reveals the relative susceptibility of the landscape to surface deformation by means of non-linear analysis of drainage network. The geometrical characteristics of the drainage network are quite capable of discriminating the impact of active tectonics. This study uses fractal dimension, lacunarity and succolarity techniques to demarcate numerous zones where the drainage network is tectonically controlled. Rose diagrams are used to compare drainage network orientation with the faults. This investigation is primarily based on the basic concept that the drainage network is subject to linearized and modify from its natural geometrical shape and orientation under the influence of tectonic activity. The areas with similar fractal dimension can be further discriminated by lacunarity and succolarity analysis. A detailed textural investigation of the drainage network (Strahler order ≥2) of Secchia, Panaro and Reno mountain river basins in northern Apennines, Italy is carried out to analyze the linearization, translational invariance and rotation of the stream patterns. The low fractal dimension values of Secchia, Panaro, Reno, Dragone, Dolo and Setta rivers indicate tectonically controlled drainage. The results reveal that the fractal dimension, lineament density and orientation analysis of drainage network and faults is a significant tool to pinpoint areas susceptible to active deformation.

Description:    A time series of geographic images can be viewed from two perspectives: as a set of images, each image representing a slice of time, or as a grid of temporal profiles (one at each pixel location). In the context of Principal Components Analysis (PCA), these different orientations are known as T-mode and S-mode analysis respectively. In the sparse literature on these modes it is recognized that they produce different results, but the reasons have not been fully explored. In this paper we investigate the interactions between space-time orientation and standardization and centering in PCA. Standardization refers to the eigenanalysis of the inter-variable correlation matrix rather than the variance-covariance matrix while centering refers to the subtraction of the mean in the development of either matrix. Using time series of monthly anomalies in lower tropospheric temperature from the Microwave Sounding Unit (MSU) as well as in CO 2 in the middle troposphere from the Atmospheric Infrared Sounder (AIRS), we show that with T-mode PCA, standardization has the effect of giving equal weight to each time step while centering has the effect of detrending over time. In contrast, with S-mode PCA, standardization has the effect of giving equal weight to each location in space while centering detrends over space. Further, in the formation of components, S-mode PCA preferences patterns that are prevalent over space while T-mode PCA preferences patterns that are prevalent over time. The two orientations thus provide complementary insights into the nature of variability within the series. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-8 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0082-7 Authors Elia Axinia Machado-Machado, Clark Labs, Graduate School of Geography, Clark University, Worcester, MA, USA Neeti Neeti, Clark Labs, Graduate School of Geography, Clark University, Worcester, MA, USA J. Ronald Eastman, Clark Labs, Graduate School of Geography, Clark University, Worcester, MA, USA Hao Chen, Clark Labs, Clark University, Worcester, MA, USA Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    The machine readable encoding language XML is used in water informatics to describe resources and observational data, such as the Water Data Transfer Format (WDTF). WDTF is part of an Australian initiative, established by the Australian Bureau of Meteorology in collaboration with CSIRO, to collate water resources data from multiple data providers into a national water information system. A common way of validating XML data is by defining a schema using XML Schema Definition language (XSD) and performing validation using standard XSD tools. However, XSD validation lacks the ability to perform content validation to assert context, domain and organizational rules such as soft-typing, co-constraints, and code-list or vocabulary checking, which is required in the validation of WDTF data. In this paper, we describe a validation service for validating water resources data encoded in WDTF, which combines structural and content validation. We also describe the use of a vocabulary service with the WDTF validation service to perform code-list and vocabulary checking. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-13 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0084-5 Authors Jonathan Yu, Land and Water, CSIRO, Highett, VIC, Australia Simon Cox, Earth Science and Resource Engineering, CSIRO, Kensington, WA, Australia Gavin Walker, ICT Centre, CSIRO, Canberra, Australia Paul J. Box, Land and Water, CSIRO, Sydney, NSW, Australia Paul Sheahan, Bureau of Meteorology, Canberra, Australia Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    Numerous efforts have been made to study how the spatial distribution of ground surface objects controls the image semivariogram. The present paper is centered on how the histograms and semivariograms of the individual bands x and y influence the spatial variation of a simple spectral ratio u  = arctan( x/y ). The image histogram of each separate band is described by a proper distribution. The exponential model is used to describe the semivariograms of x and y . Taking the first derivatives of the spectral ratio u for x and y and taking into account the mathematical behavior of the histograms of bands x and y , an approximate expression for the semivariogram γ u of the spectral ratio is derived. This mathematical expression shows how the spatial variation of the spectral ratio depends on the standard deviations of the histograms, as well as the ranges of the semivariograms of x and y . Experimentation with multispectral images is then carried out and it shows that theoretical predictions agree, in qualitative terms, with real data. The results and conclusions of this paper may be useful in assessing the efficiency of various spectral band ratios and vegetation indices, which are often used in geological and environmental research (mapping of hydrothermal zones and land cover types). Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-9 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0092-5 Authors George Aim Skianis, Faculty of Geology and Geo-Environment, Department of Geography and Climatology, Remote Sensing Laboratory, University of Athens, Panepistimiopolis, Athens, 157 84 Greece Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    A new method for elevation and latitude decorrelation stretch of multi-temporal land surface temperature (LST) in the East Africa Rift System (EARS) from MODIS 2008 monthly average night imagery and Globe digital elevation model (DEM) is presented. Multiple linear regression analysis of principal components images (PCAs) quantifies the variance explained by elevation and latitude. Selective variance reduction (SVR) reconstructs the multi-temporal LST imagery from the residual images and selected PCAs by taking into account the portion of variance not related to elevation and latitude. Clustering of the reconstructed imagery identifies two major thermal anomalies a) in the Afar Triangle, and b) a new one in between the Ethiopia and Kenya. These regions present LST values higher than the elevation and latitude predicted ones through out the year. It is assumed that the new thermal anomaly corresponds to a triple junction formed in between the Ethiopian Rift and the Eastern and the Western branches of the EARS, in an area where active volcanoes and mantle plume activity concentrate. SVR is expected to assist tectonic and volcanic zones characterization on the basis of their thermal response. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-12 DOI 10.1007/s12145-011-0091-6 Authors George Miliaresis, Remote Sensing & GIS Center, Sultan Qaboos University, Muscat, Sultanate of Oman Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description: Water resource and hydrologic modeling studies are intrinsically related to spatial processes of hydrologic cycle. Due to generally sparse data, and high rainfall variability, the accurate prediction of water availability in complex semi-arid catchment depends to a great extent on how well spatial input data describe realistically the relevant characteristics. The Geographic Information System (GIS) provides the framework within which spatially distributed data are collected and used to prepare model input files. Despite significant recent developments in distributed hydrologic modeling, the over-parameterization is usually a critical issue that can complicate calibration process. Sensitivity analysis methods reducing the number of parameters to be adjusted during calibration are important for simplifying the use of these models. The objective of this paper is to perform a sensitivity analysis for flow in a semi-arid catchment (1,491 km2), located in northwestern of Tunisia, using the Soil and Water Assessment Tool (SWAT) model. The simulation results revealed that among eight selected parameters, curve number (CN2), soil evaporation compensation factor (ESCO), soil available water capacity (SOL_AWC) and threshold depth of water in the shallow aquifer required for return flow (GWQMN) were found to be the most sensitive parameters. Calibration of hydrology, facilitated by the sensitivity analysis, was performed for the period 2001 through 2003. Results of calibration showed that the model accurately predict runoff and performed well with a monthly Nash Sutcliffe efficiency (NSE) of 0,78, a coefficient of determination (R 2 ) of 0,85 and a percent of bias (PBIAS) equal to −13,22 %.

Description: Development of knowledge engineering makes it possible to bring an information space relating to an entire domain of knowledge within the field of geoscience into a strict form, which is both computer-tractable and convenient for collaborative research work. Nevertheless, there are issues that seriously hamper this process – the problem of defining key terms, which is often not shared by the colleagueship, and interrelation of concepts developed by different schools within the colleagueship focused on different aspects of this domain. Another issue is the export of results to a wider community unfamiliar with the specificity of local studies. All these issues can be successfully addressed by a novel technique of knowledge engineering, the event bush, brought into the COLLA environment for geoscientific collaborative studies. This paper demonstrates how the said issues can be resolved by the example of one of the most important information domains in the field of seismology, the site effects. Text, graphics, tabular data and a physical model coming from different sources and different contexts are united in one context keeping all the specificity of original understanding and allowing the researchers keep on following their own context and terminology.

Description: Remote sensing images have been widely used by intelligence analysts to discover geospatial features. The overwhelming volume of remote sensing imagery requires automated methods or systems for feature discovery. Existing research focuses on automatic extraction of isolated or elementary features, such as buildings and roads. It is rather understudied to discover complex geospatial features, which is spatially composed of elementary features. From the e-Science perspective, service computing technologies have shown great promise for widespread automation of data analysis and computation. The discovery of complex features would benefit from service computing technologies by computing spatial relations and their fuzziness among elementary features using geoprocessing services. The discovery process can be automated using an ontology approach. The paper presents how ontologies for complex geospatial features, enriched with fuzzy sets of spatial relations, can automate the workflow generation. Spatial computation functions, fuzzy membership functions, and mathematical fuzzy logical operators, are provided as services, and plugged into workflows on demand to enjoy the benefits of service computing technologies. A prototype system demonstrates on-demand uncertainty-aware detection of complex geospatial features in a geoprocessing service environment.

Description: Polar regions have garnered substantial research attention in recent years because they are key drivers of the Earth’s climate, a source of rich mineral resources, and the home of a variety of marine life. Nevertheless, global warming over the past century is pushing the polar systems towards a tipping point: the systems are at high-risk from melting snow and sea ice covers, permafrost thawing, and acidification of the Arctic oceans. To increase understanding of the polar environment, the National Science Foundation established a Polar Cyberinfrastructure (CI) program, aimed at utilizing advanced software architecture to support polar data analysis and decision-making. At the center of this Polar CI research are data resources and data discovery components that facilitate the search and retrieval of polar data. This paper reports our development of a semantic search tool that supports the intelligent discovery of polar datasets. This tool is built on latent semantic analysis techniques, which improves search performance by identifying hidden semantic associations between terminologies used in the various datasets’ metadata. The software tool is implemented using an object-oriented design pattern and has been successfully integrated into a popular open source metadata catalog as a new semantic search support. A semantic matrix is maintained persistently within the catalogue to store the semantic associations. A dynamic update mechanism was also developed to allow automated update of semantics once more metadata are loaded into or removed from the catalog. We explored the effects of rank reduction to the effectiveness of this semantic search module and demonstrated its better performance than the traditional search techniques.

Description: This paper deals with the morphological changes of the lower Brahmaputra-Jamuna River (BJR) in Bangladesh. Within few decades, the planform of the river has been changed abruptly by the combined effect of natural process and human interventions. Morphological features observing in this study were river planform, channel width, bankline migration and channel bed elevation. Eighteen sets of remote sensing data series from 1973 to 2011were analyzed using ERDAS/Imagine and GIS to document the variation of geomorphic elements of the lower BJR. GIS analysis of remote sensing data showed that the changes of channel planform were quite significant over the past 40 years, occurring two major phases of channel development. The changing patterns in the first phase (i.e., between 1973 and 1992) were quite irregular. However, the second phase ranging between 1992 and 2011 was unidirectional (mostly eastward). In general, the studied river reach was widened and the average rate of migration was 225 m y –1 that was three–folds the values of the first phase. The height and slope of sand bars were gradually increasing, showing the highest value around the Jamuna Multipurpose Bridge (JMB) section. The planform characteristics of BJR at the downstream of JMB showed that the river reach was gradually widening and shifting eastwards. However, the reach at the upstream of the JMB showed westward migration. The recent trends of channel changes suggest that the river planform has lost it’s naturally condition and it may, therefore, be predicted that increasing nature of channel width likely to continue in the immediate future.

Description: Drought is a complex phenomenon which can be characterised mainly by its severity, duration and areal extent. Among these three dimensions, drought severity is the key factor which can be used for drought analysis. Drought indices are typically used to assess drought severity in a meaningful way. DrinC (Drought Indices Calculator) is a software package which was developed for providing a simple, though adaptable interface for the calculation of drought indices. The paper aims at presenting the overall design and the implementation of the software along with the utilisation of various approaches for drought analysis. DrinC can be used for the calculation of two recently developed indices, the Reconnaissance Drought Index (RDI) and the Streamflow Drought Index (SDI), as well as two widely known indices, the Standardised Precipitation Index (SPI) and the Precipitation Deciles (PD). Moreover, the software includes a module for the estimation of potential evapotranspiration (PET) through temperature based methods, useful for the calculation of RDI. The software may be used in a variety of applications, such as drought monitoring, assessment of the spatial distribution of drought, investigation of climatic and drought scenarios, etc. The applications of DrinC in several locations, especially in arid and semi-arid regions, show that it is gaining ground as a useful research and operational tool for drought analysis.

Description: Mesoscale convective systems are high impact convectively driven weather systems that contribute large amounts to the precipitation daily and monthly totals at various locations globally. As such, an understanding of the lifecycle, characteristics, frequency and seasonality of these convective features is important for several sectors and studies in climate studies, agricultural and hydrological studies, and disaster management. This study explores the applicability of graph theory to creating a fully automated algorithm for identifying mesoscale convective systems and determining their precipitation characteristics from satellite datasets. Our results show that applying graph theory to this problem allows for the identification of features from infrared satellite data and the seamlessly identification in a precipitation rate satellite-based dataset, while innately handling the inherent complexity and non-linearity of mesoscale convective systems.

Description: The northeastern part of the Peloponnese is tectonically active and it is the object of study of many geomorphologists since it provides information for the evolution of the terrain, comparable with other similar areas. The study area in this paper is a small segment of northeastern Peloponnese, where we try to understand the evolution of the relief using geomorphological and archaeological data. We study the flow of the river systems Asopos and Nemeas - which are in the wider area of the Nemea archaeological site - in order to understand how the evolution of these rivers in time affected the overall image of the area. In order to access our goal, aerial photographs and GIS analysis were used. The geomorphological and tectonic analysis of the area and the development and evolution of settlements therein (based on archaeological studies) gave us clues regarding the shape of the terrain over time. The main factors affecting the shape of the terrain (intense tectonic activity and headward erosion) were not adequate reasons - in our case - to effect immediate abandonment of the area (since, in the human timescale, they are fairly slow processes). Their effect, however, is evident over time, in the form of gradual abandonment of sites, movement of settlements or the creation of new settlements.

Description: Ensuring long-term accessibility of Earth Science archive data is a recurrent issue for data centers. Heterogeneity of data adds particular challenges. The Data Virtualisation Toolkit (DVT) has been developed by the SCIDIP-ES project to support long-term access and use of heterogeneous Earth Science (ES) data in a format-independent manner. DVT provides four key functions: (a) edit format description, (b) interpret bit stream into data values using the format description, (c) construct legacy information from data values via coherent information models, and (d) visualize the retrieved legacy information if the information model is supported by the visualization component. The toolkit incorporates a tree structure editor, a bit stream interpretation engine, information models in XQuery, and a visualization component. DVT is designed to provide long term access to Earth Science data with the proper representation information which contains the technical knowledge required for interpretation. A trial application using both vector and raster data shows that DVT could provide interoperable solutions to support the long-term preservation of ES data. This paper reports on the concept, development, and implementation of DVT.

Description: The problem of fast pattern classification by automatic analytical and sorting techniques is relevant across a wide range of scientific and technical disciplines. Since the availability of mass transactional and experimental data sets to address the challenges faced by the Earth and environmental scientists, validation of zoning has become an important topic. In this paper, we propose a new approach for producing Automatic Integrated Self-Organized Optimum Zoning (AISOOZ) maps using comprehensive (multivariate) geological and geophysical data. Unlike conventional zoning, the new approach includes techniques for finding the optimal structure that best fits natural pattern of a given area without the benefit of any a priori class information. While there are obvious similarities between the conventional and new optimal zoning maps, the automatic optimal approach reveals new insights into the geological evolution of the study area that could not be observed on the conventional maps. The success of the AISOOZ case study encourages the enlargement of its scope and application for rapid online as well as offline interactive multivariate pattern discovery in the Earth and environmental sciences studies. Finally, a comparative study between two widely used stopping criteria for optimal zoning and pattern recognition has been performed.

Description: This study applies the self-organizing map (SOM) neural network model for sub pixel mapping of alteration minerals in the Masahim volcano, SE Iran, using Hyperion data. Four end-members including sericite, kaolinite, epidote, and montmorillonite/illite were identified from the imagery, and based on these end-members training areas were generated and used to train the model. Numerous tests were conducted for selecting the optimal neural network architecture. The confusion matrix was calculated to identify the accuracy of map produced by SOM. The confusion matrix indicated that among the different SOM architectures, the result of 55 × 55 array of nodes with overall accuracy of 83 % was the best architecture for describing the spatial distribution of alteration unit. The coefficient of determination (R 2 ) was also calculated to assess the accuracy of sub pixel fraction maps. The R 2 coefficient was 0.60 for kaolinite, 0.72 for sericite, 0.58 for epidote and 0.62 for montmorillonite/illite .The mapping results revealed that kaolinite, sericite and montmorillonite/illite are emplaced in the caldera of the volcano and epidote is mainly found at the northwestern part of caldera. It can be concluded that the SOM is useful in mineral mapping and exploration activities.

Description: There is increasing need to use the widest range of data to address issues of environmental management and change, which is reflected in increasing emphasis from government funding agencies for better management and access to environmental data. Bringing together different environmental datasets to confidently enable integrated analysis requires reference to common standards and definitions, which are frequently lacking in environmental data, due to the broad subject area and lack of metadata. Automatic inclusion within datasets of controlled vocabulary concepts from publicly available standard vocabularies facilitates accurate annotation and promotes efficiency of metadata creation. To this end, we have developed a thesaurus capable of describing environmental chemistry datasets. We demonstrate a novel method for tagging datasets, via insertion of this thesaurus into a Laboratory Information Management System, enabling automated tagging of data, thus promoting semantic interoperability between tagged data resources. Being web available, and formatted using the Simple Knowledge Organisation System (SKOS) semantic standard, this thesaurus is capable of providing links both to and from other relevant thesauri, thus facilitating a linked data approach. Future developments will see extension of the thesaurus by the user community, in terms of both concepts included and links to externally hosted vocabularies. By employing a Linked Open Data approach, we anticipate that Web-based tools will be able to use concepts from the thesaurus to discover and link data to other information sources, including use in national assessment of the extent and condition of environmental resources.

Description:    Cellular Automata (CA) simulation models have been increasingly used in land use studies. However, neighborhood configuration, an essential element of CA model, remarkably impacts the accuracy of simulated results. Moreover, errors from data source may propagate through the CA modeling process. The objective of this study is to analyze the effect of neighborhood configuration to CA model and further on to explore its capacity of resisting disturbance from data source error. With statistic-based CA model and several neighborhood configurations respectively, the land use changes of Wuhan, China were analyzed. It is demonstrated that there are significant differences on the simulated results produced by different neighborhoods. Besides, different neighborhoods respond differently to data source error. In light of these results, we find out that (1) neighborhood configurations with larger neighborhood size and planar neighborhood type, introduced in this paper, contribute to higher prediction accuracy; and (2) the neighborhood configurations above also have higher capacity of resisting disturbance from data source error and give rise to more stable simulated results. This study provides a comprehensive basis for scale selection of CA model with a meaningful consideration of data source error and thus will improve the research on land use change. Content Type Journal Article Category RESEARCH ARTICLE Pages 1-10 DOI 10.1007/s12145-012-0097-8 Authors Hao Wu, School of Resources and Environmental Engineering, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan, China 430070 Lu Zhou, School of Resources and Environmental Engineering, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan, China 430070 Xu Chi, School of Resources and Environmental Engineering, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan, China 430070 Yan Li, School of Resources and Environmental Engineering, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan, China 430070 Yurong Sun, School of Resources and Environmental Engineering, Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan, China 430070 Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description:    The nearest neighbor search algorithm is one of the major factors that influence the efficiency of grid interpolation. This paper introduces a KD-tree that is a two-dimensional index structure for use in grid interpolation. It also proposes an improved J-nearest neighbor search strategy based on “priority queue” and “neighbor lag” concepts. In the strategy, two types of J-nearest neighbor search algorithms can be used; these algorithms correspond to the consideration of a fixed number of points and a fixed radius. By using the KD-tree and proposed strategy, interpolation can be performed with methods such as Inverse Distance Weighting and Kriging. Experimental results show that the proposed algorithms has high operating efficiency, especially when the data amount is enormous, and high practical value for increasing the efficiency of grid interpolation. Content Type Journal Article Category Research Article Pages 1-7 DOI 10.1007/s12145-012-0106-y Authors Hao Huang, Jiangsu Provincial Key Laboratory of Geographic Information Science and Technology, Nanjing University, Nanjing, 210093 China Can Cui, Urban and Regional Research Centre Utrecht, Faculty of Geosciences, Utrecht University, Utrecht, 3584 CS The Netherlands Liang Cheng, Jiangsu Provincial Key Laboratory of Geographic Information Science and Technology, Nanjing University, Nanjing, 210093 China Qiang Liu, Northwest Institute of Nuclear Technology, Xi’an, 710024 China Jiechen Wang, Jiangsu Provincial Key Laboratory of Geographic Information Science and Technology, Nanjing University, Nanjing, 210093 China Journal Earth Science Informatics Online ISSN 1865-0481 Print ISSN 1865-0473

Description: Population increase and climate change are stretching not only the world’s but also Pakistan’s water resources. This has directly been responsible for the recurring patterns of floods and droughts in the country which emphasizes the importance of the fact that efficient practices need to be adopted for water resource sustainability. This study investigates the use of upland catchment information, comprising of hydrometeorological datasets for inflow prediction to the Tarbela reservoir (a multipurpose reservoir located on River Indus) using Artificial Neural Networks (ANN) and Regression Techniques (Standard and Step Wise). Input Combination and data length selection for all the selected techniques were performed with the aid of Gamma test (GT). This study has made a significant contribution for future water resource management within the Indus Basin as Tarbela is the main source of irrigation, water supply and hydropower generation in Pakistan along with flood control.

Description: Numerical agglomerative hierarchical classification is fundamentally an unsupervised method of grouping individuals on which there are multivariate data so as to identify natural groups in them and perhaps in the populations from which they are drawn and where no prior classification exists or is assumed. We have used the technique to make a tectonic regionalization of the Zagros region and to see whether it can increase our understanding of the regional tectonics. We first identified 137 sub-areas as units for each of which we had recorded 18 quantitative variables; these formed our data, which we held in a data matrix of n  = 137 rows and p  = 18 columns. After data standardization, we computed the relationships among all pairs of sub-areas as Euclidean distances and then grouped them hierarchically using Ward’s method to form a dendrogram. Cutting the dendrogram at several levels of dissimilarity provided a series of tectonic zoning maps which matched the trends in tectonic evolution of the region. This sequence, obtained automatically, agrees well with our general understanding of the geology. However, in the present study some new findings about the tectonic nature of the region were obtained. For example, the role of the Kazerun-Qatar and Oman lines as two major structural features has been clearly demonstrated. In addition, a striking difference between the Minab zone and the other parts of the Zagros region has been observed. This study simply presents the necessity and usefulness of hierarchical cluster analysis, as an appropriate statistical pattern recognition technique, for increasing the degree of the objectivity of the regionalization researches in the Earth sciences.

Description: Sustainable management of land requires regular acquisition of qualitative information regarding the status of its use. It is especially important to track the changes relating to the land’s competitive development needs such as mining. The field-based monitoring of a mine with a wide footprint is expensive and time-consuming. Remote sensing techniques have been developed and demonstrated as cost-effective alternatives for the conventional methods of land use/land cover (LULC) monitoring. In this study, the land cover changes that occurred between the year of 2000 and 2009 in a kaolin mining and processing area in the Kutch region of India are mapped using two Landsat-5 Thematic Mapper (TM) images. For this purpose, the spectral signature of the land covers including vegetation cover and kaolin were determined and matched filtering (MF) method was applied to classify the images. The overall accuracy of the classified 2009 image was estimated for the kaolin and the vegetation cover to 89.5 and 86.0 % respectively. The change in the land use which occurred from 2000 to 2009 were quantified and analysed for both classes. This study provided a practical framework for rapid mapping of the land cover changes around open-cut kaolin mining area using freely available Landsat data.

Description: The study area is located ~50 km in the north of Tehran capital city, Iran, and is a part of central Alborz Mountain. The intrusive bodies aged post Eocene have intruded in the Eocene volcanic units causing hydrothermal alterations in these units. Advanced Spaceborne Thermal Emission and Reflection Radiometer (ASTER) images were used to map hydrothermal alteration zones. The propylitic, phyllic and argillic alteration and iron oxide minerals identified using Spectral Angle Mapper (SAM) method. Structural lineaments were extracted from ASTER images by applying automatic lineament extraction processes and visual interpretations. An exploration model was considered based on previous studies, and appropriate evidence maps were generated, weighted and reclassified. Ore Forming Potential (OFP) map was generated by applying Fuzzy SUM operator on alteration and Pb, Cu, Ag, and Au geochemical anomaly maps. Finally, Host rock, geological structures and OFP were combined using Fuzzy Gamma operator (γ ) to produce mineral prospectivity map. Eventually, the conceptual model discussed here, fairly demonstrated the known hydrothermal gold deposits in the study area and could be a source for future detailed explorations.

Description: In this paper we introduce a framework for developing the Exploration and Mining Cadastre System (EMCS), which involves all activities related to exploration areas, including registration and subsequent legal issues in a broader sense. It is built with two main purposes in mind: (1) enable necessary surveys, observe applicant’s reserved parcel, register the parcel online, and issue and follow up necessary permits/licenses in the field of exploration, (2) provide a mutual platform for data exchange among various service systems in the field of exploration and mining in Iran. The EMCS model is designed in Unified Modeling Language (UML) with three main sets of classes: (1) RegisterObject (2) ActivityLicense, and (3) Person. Other relevant features of the model are also specified at the class level. These include: conditional registered parcels, unregisterable areas such as prohibited or protected areas, legal borders around registered or serving parcels, reference documents such as legal survey results documents, responsibilities, and restrictions. The model also considers issues related to exploration cost, parcel code, tax, royalty, commodity, priorities, facilitations, evaluation, transfer of ownership, changing parameters, and temporal registration. The temporal aspects of the classes are also supported by the model to take care of the time periods that involve the general procedures in the registration of exploration and mining properties. We anticipate that the framework and model structure provide a platform for data storage, improve the supervision of exploration and mining process, change manual into online registration system, prevent administrative corruption, and reduce bureaucracy.

Description: Geospatial metadata is one of the key elements of the geographic resource catalogues on the Web. Catalogues such as GeoNetwork use the direct and indirect spatial references from metadata to process spatial queries. The visibility of resources in a collection often depends on the consistency of the descriptions that help to find resources. Spatially inconsistent metadata records can hide resources and make them irretrievable. This paper presents a semi-automatic approach based on the combination of spatial ranking, reverse geocoding, geographic knowledge organization systems, and information retrieval techniques able to detect geospatial inconsistencies in metadata collections. Experimental results with a dataset of Geospatial Web Service metadata records show that this approach provides a significant advantage in terms of inconsistency detection, and rich insight into the metadata. People responsible of geospatial catalogues, such as librarians and Spatial Data Infrastructure managers, could take advantage of the approach presented in this work to assess the visibility of their assets.

Description: This paper presents two innovative methods for tunnel monitoring that are based on digital photogrammetry. Both have been conceived to speed up operations that are currently accomplished by using engineering geodesy techniques and instruments. On the same time, proposed solutions are cheap and affordable. The first one is aimed at measuring relative deformations of transversal cross-section of tunnels. Some special targets are placed on the tunnel vault and their coordinates are measured by means of a small photogrammetric block made up of four images. A wire is used to setup the scale and to make all measurements comparable overtime. The second method can be applied for the measurement of vertical deformations along the longitudinal profile of tunnels. A new image-based approach called ‘photogrammetric levelling’ is discussed here, which is based on the metric rectification of each single image depicting a couple of special rods to be hung on levelling benchmarks. This technique can be used to replace traditional optical and digital level instruments. Both applications can be carried out by using a calibrated amateur camera. Some experiments in controlled and real environments allowed assessing performances and limitations of these techniques for operational surveys in tunnel monitoring.

Description: In this paper an automated procedure for surface reconstruction that can be used for surveying and monitoring rock and ground slopes is presented. This method has been developed for geological and engineering applications, where accuracy and completeness are factors of primary importance for the final 3D model, which must provide a detailed metric survey and not only a visual reconstruction of the scene. The proposed procedure integrates two image matching techniques. The first one is used to automatically extract a set of tie points that are needed for computing the exterior orientation parameters of all images through a photogrammetric bundle adjustment. Such tie oints are also exploited to obtain a preliminary seed model that is then enriched based on Multi-photo Least Squares Matching. During this second stage, the surface model is improved in terms of point density and accuracy. Different strategies were implemented to successfully combine both techniques, along with some new improvements. The presented procedure has been tested in two different applications: geometric modelling of rock cliffs and evaluation of weathering of a ground slope. In both cases the obtained results presented accuracy sufficient for geological investigation. Moreover, outcomes were comparable to the ones from laser scanning surveying and other photogrammetric implementations.

Description: Similarity and part-whole relations are important for problem-solving in geology. In this article, we propose a concept representation framework that can represent similarity and part-relations in an integrated way. We exemplify the framework by showing an algorithm for well log interpretation based on partonomical similarity.

Description: In this paper we present a controlled vocabulary service application (CVSA) that we primarily developed in semantic support for the Environmental Data Store (EDS), but also as an access point for other controlled vocabularies that are commonly used in the environmental field. We use a Simple Knowledge Organization System (SKOS) implementation for the representation of the controlled vocabularies associated with the EDS in addition to those others that we placed side by side. The EDS controlled vocabularies were created as an amalgamation of eight commonly used vocabularies, taxonomies, and ontologies in the geoscience/environmental informatics community. From these, ten top concepts were selected or defined as the base of our classification system. We deploy the TemaTres, implementation of SKOS which is an open-source, web –based thesaurus management package to create and manage our EDS vocabularies. TemaTresView and VisualVocabulary tools that work well with TemaTres are also integrated in the application to provide tree view and graphical view of the vocabulary structure. The open source edition of Virtuoso Universal Server is used to provide a Web interface in support of SPARQL queries against the EDS controlled vocabularies. Replicas of some of the key vocabularies commonly used in the community are also maintained as part of the application, such as the General Multilingual Environmental Thesaurus (GEMET), and the NetCDF Climate and Forecast (CF) Standard Names. The application has been deployed as an elementary and experimental prototype that can be accessed at http://edscvs.ccny.cuny.edu .

Description: The paper presents Karhunen-Loeve Transform-based compression method, which can be applied to reduce the volume of data describing seabed topography. Developed algorithm allows for variable compression ratio and a possibility to limit the maximal reconstruction error. These properties have been introduced to the method because of the practical aspects of analysed problem. During the development, many experiments have been performed. The results presented in the paper show that the application of KLT in a conjunction with a set of so called common eigensurfaces gives high compression ratio for data representing seabed. In comparison to other well-known methods (Discrete Cosine Transform or Wavelet Transform based) the compression ratio is, in many cases, much higher. A novel solution for the problem of blank nodes occurrence and of storing irregular surface shapes is presented. The final compression algorithm presented here can become an important element of modern storage and management systems (handling vast data) that are used nowadays in maritime technology. Thanks to the open architecture, developed algorithm can be extended with other solutions aimed at seabed topographic measurement and visualisation.

Description: The LASP Extended Metadata Repository (LEMR) is a semantically enabled repository of information (metadata) about the scientific datasets that LASP offers to the public. The repository enables the provision of consistent, current, verified metadata to our users. It serves as a Single Source of Truth for this information, enabling more rigorous metadata management and addressing problems related to duplication of information. The linked open data aspect of the repository allows interlinking of concepts both within and across organizations and web sites. Associated interfaces allow users to browse and search the metadata. This information can be dynamically incorporated into web pages, so web page content is always up-to-date and consistent across the lab. With this information we can generate metadata records in a variety of schemas, such as ISO or SPASE, allowing federation with other organizations interested in our data. We leveraged open source technologies to build the repository and the dynamic web pages that read from it. VIVO, an open source semantic web application, provided key capabilities such as ontology and triple store management interfaces. AngularJS, an open source JavaScript framework for building web dynamic applications, was also invaluable in developing web pages that provide semantically enabled public interfaces to the metadata. In this paper we discuss our use of these tools and what we had to craft in order to meet our lab-specific needs.

Description: We have initiated a project aimed at enhancing interdisciplinary understanding and usability of polar data by diverse communities. We have produced computer- and human-understandable models of sea ice that can be used to support the interoperability of a wide range of sea ice data. This has the potential to improve scientific predictive analyses and increase usage of the data by scientists, modelers, and forecasters as well as residents of communities that rely on sea ice. We have developed a family of ontologies, leveraging existing best in class models, including one module describing physical characteristics of sea ice, another describing sea ice charts, and a third modeling “egg codes” - an internationally accepted standard for symbolically representing sea ice within geographic regions. We used a semantic Web methodology to rapidly gather and refine requirements, design and iterate over the ontologies, and to evaluate the ontologies with respect to the use cases. We gathered requirements from a wide range of potential stakeholders reflecting the interests of operational ice centers, ice researchers, and indigenous people. We introduce the driving use case and provide an overview of the resulting open source ontologies. We also introduce some key technical considerations including the prominent role of provenance, terms of use, and credit in the model. We describe how the ontologies are being employed and highlight their compatibility with a wide range of existing standards previously developed by many of the stakeholder communities.

Description: Rapid retrieval of spatial information is critical to ensure that emergency supplies and resources can reach the impacted areas in the most efficient manner. However, it remains challenging to find out the needed spatial information efficiently because of the intensive geocomputation processes involved and the heterogeneity of spatial data. It is quite cost prohibitive to query the spatial information from geographical knowledge bases containing complex topological relationships. This research introduces a Map-Reduce based parallel approach for improving the query performance of a geospatial ontology for disaster response. The approach focuses on parallelizing the spatial join computations of GeoSPARQL queries. The proposed parallel approach makes full use of data/task parallelism for spatial queries. The results of some initial experiments show that the proposed approach can reduce individual spatial query execution time by taking advantage of parallel processes. The proposed approach, therefore, may afford a large number of concurrent spatial queries in disaster response applications.

Description: Evaluation of groundwater potential is a multi-criteria and multi-level comprehensive assessment system that needs judgment of decision makers in making decision. To avoid subjectivity or the preference of decision makers in the assessment, catastrophe theory based evaluation method is proposed in this study which calculates the importance of one criterion over other by its inner mechanism and thus, avoid subjectivity. The proposed method is applied for the assessment of groundwater potential zones in the arid region of lower Balochistan province of Pakistan. The groundwater is considered as a system with five sub-systems namely, geology, soil, drainage density, slope and rainfall. Seventeen sub-system indicators of groundwater potential are selected for modeling groundwater potential zone. The catastrophe theory is applied to derive the relative weights of indicators in predicting groundwater potential. Thematic maps of sub-systems are integrated within a geographical information system and the groundwater potential zones of the integrated layer are calculated by using the weights of indicators. The results are verified by existing number of tube wells operating in the study area. It has been found that the number of tube wells is more in the area where the groundwater potential is high. The study reveals that catastrophe theory is suitable for assessing groundwater potential.

Description: The Regional Climate Model Evaluation System (RCMES) facilitates the rapid, flexible inclusion of NASA observations into climate model evaluations. RCMES provides two fundamental components. A database (RCMED) is a scalable point-oriented cloud database used to elastically store remote sensing observations and to make them available using a space time query interface. The analysis toolkit (RCMET) is a Python-based toolkit that can be delivered as a cloud virtual machine, or as an installer package deployed using Python Buildout to users in order to allow for temporal and spatial regridding, metrics calculation (RMSE, bias, PDFs, etc.) and end-user visualization. RCMET is available to users in an “offline”, lone scientist mode based on a virtual machine dynamically constructed with model outputs and observations to evaluate; or on an institution’s computational cluster seated close to the observations and model outputs. We have leveraged RCMES within the content of the Coordinated Regional Downscaling Experiment (CORDEX) project, working with the University of Cape Town and other institutions to compare the model output to NASA remote sensing data; in addition we are also working with the North American Regional Climate Change Assessment Program (NARCCAP). In this paper we explain the contribution of cloud computing to RCMES’s specifically describing studies of various cloud databases we evaluated for RCMED, and virtualization toolkits for RCMET, and their potential strengths in delivering user-created dynamic regional climate model evaluation virtual machines for our users.

Description: Land abandonment and stagnation of rural markets in the last few years have become one of the main concerns of rural administrations. The use of Web and GIS (Geographic Information System) technologies can help to mitigate the effects of these problems. This paper pro-poses a novel Web-GIS tool with spatial capabilities for the dynamization of rural land markets by encouraging the transfer of land from owners to farmers through the leasing of plots. The system, based on open source software, offers information about the properties, their environment and their owners. It uses standards for handling the geographic information and for communicating with external data sources. This system was used as the basis for the development of SITEGAL, the tool for the management of the Land Bank of Galicia ( www.bantegal.com/sitegal ). SITEGAL has been operational since 2007 obtaining benefits for both administration and users (farmers and land owners), and promoting the e-Government.

Description: Despite the extensive records on geomorphological studies in Iran, meteorite impact craters have so far not been considered in to account. Based on both remote sensing technique and field work we have recognized the circular structure of Zirouki crater in the Samsour desert, southeast of Iran, which if confirmed as an impact structure, would be the third impact structure candidate in the Middle East after the Wabar craters in Saudia Arabia and Jebel Waqf as Suwwan in Jordan. Geomorphological investigation of the possible impact structure of Zirouki crater was done based on multi criteria methodology including of geological, topographical, geophysical and petrographical studies. Among different studies, topographical investigation indicated that the crater shape morphology was quite obvious with a central uplift projection; as well geophysical pattern provided very strong evidence for possible impact structure, indicating the presence of circular negative gravity anomaly at the whole of the crater.