IN42A-01
Google Earth for the Advancement of Science
Google Earth has been downloaded over 250 million times since June of 2005. Learn how scientists are leveraging the powerful visualization capabilities of Google Earth, and its world-wide audience, to get better recognition for their research, provide educational opportunities, and obtain better funding. The presentation will include demonstrations of several science and educational visualizations, and tips for making effective Google Earth content.
IN42A-02
3Dconnexion: Exploring the GIS terrain with 3D mouse technology
3Dconnexion, A Logitech Company, makes and manufactures 3D mice products. These products employ a 6DOF optical sensor which allows full six-axis movement (X, Y and Z translations and rotations) in GIS and Geobrowser software. Scientists and other professionals, as well as enthusiasts, exploring the earth and beyond can pilot themselves around the terrain to analyze geographical data, zooming in on an altitude to examine data closely and effortlessly. With this 3D mouse sensor technology, the interruptions that occur while examining geological data are minimized or non-existent, and the professional can concentrate at the task at hand. http://www.3dconnexion.com
IN42A-03 INVITED
Using Google Maps® and Google Earth® to Represent Weather Events
Google Maps(r) and Google Earth(r) offer exciting opportunities for the display of archived and current weather events. This talk demonstrates a system that provides Keyhole Markup Language (KML) files for 1950 through current tornadic events with links to user supplied imagery and video. The tools provided can also be used as Google Mapplets for incorporation into other geobrowser applications. This represents social networking based on shared experiences with severe weather and can be used to stimulate student inquiry. The presentation includes a demonstration of the tools and other visualizations of geolocated data with examples of classroom use. http://www.wunderground.com/
IN42A-04
Using Virtual Globes and a Java web Application to Visualize and Compare Ocean Observations and Model Data
In order to better predict how the Earth's changing climate will affect ocean circulation, and more generally the behaviour of the ocean-atmosphere system, ocean modellers need to have the ability to accurately assimilate historical and near-real time data into their models. This process has traditionally included the use of fairly static plots of model and observed data in order to attempt to visualize where discrepancies between the two are greatest. Here we present OceanDIVA - Ocean Data Intercomparison and Visualization Application. OceanDIVA can read in ocean data from both local sources, and from any publicly accessible data holdings worldwide via OPeNDAP, and output the data into either Google Earth or a freely-available online virtual globe. One of its key capabilities is to read in model data from one source and observed data from another unrelated source, and to compare the two - giving data on the misfit. This is done in the form of colour-coded observation locations, or statistical difference plots averaged over regions which can be displayed on the virtual globe. If a particular profile is of interest then users may click on that icon and OceanDIVA will proceed to generate a plot of data with depth on the fly. Data may also be plotted on temperature levels which removes errors associated with estimating the depth at which water masses are found. By harvesting the power and ease of use of virtual globes, we see this as a useful tool to visualize and compare data from different sources, generating new datasets which have more value than the sum of their constituent parts. OceanDIVA could be readily expanded to incorporate, for example, satellite data, biological marine data, or data over land.
IN42A-05
Visualizing earthquake simulation data
Earthquake simulations produce vast amount of data. Much of the analysis is tied to what happens on the ground surface. To facilitate this investigation a rich geo-context is a must. Unfortunately, large amount of archived data from simulation is not seamlessly available to scientists. Virtual globes are becoming increasingly rich in contextual information and could be coupled with simulation data to provide this environment to scientists. We demonstrate such a system which integrates over 10 TB of earthquake simulation data and creates a variety of visualization products that integrates with virtual globes. The application web portal provides an intuitive and easy to use interface for scientific investigation, collaboration and dissemination of data. http://megahertz.sdsc.edu:3141/scecportal/ajax.ge.php
IN42A-06
Google Earth as a Vehicle to Integrating Multiple Layers of Environmental Satellite Data for Weather and Science Applications
One of the main challenges facing current and future environmental satellite systems (e.g, the future National Polar Orbiting Environmental Satellite System (NPOESS)) is reaching and entraining the diverse user community via communication of how these systems address their particular needs. A necessary element to meeting this challenge is effective data visualization: facilitating the display, animation and layering of multiple satellite imaging and sounding sensors (providing complementary information) in a user-friendly and intuitive fashion. In light of the fact that these data are rapidly making their way into the classroom owing to efficient and timely data archival systems and dissemination over the Internet, there is a golden opportunity to leverage existing technology to introduce environmental science to wide spectrum of users. Google Earth’s simplified interface and underlying markup language enables access to detailed global geographic information, and contains features which are both desirable and advantageous for geo-referencing and combining a wide range of environmental satellite data types. Since these satellite data are available with a variety of horizontal spatial resolutions (tens of km down to hundreds of meters), the imagery can be sub-setted (tiled) at a very small size. This allows low-bandwidth users to efficiently view and animate a sequence of imagery while zoomed out from the surface, whereas high-bandwidth users can efficiently zoom into the finest image resolution when viewing fine-scale phenomena such as fires, volcanic activity, as well as the details of meteorological phenomena such as hurricanes, rainfall, lightning, winds, etc. Dynamically updated network links allow for near real-time updates such that these data can be integrated with other Earth-hosted applications and exploited not only in the teaching environment, but also for operational users in the government and private industry sectors. To conceptualize how environmental satellite data would be utilized within a geobrowser in a near real-time setting, we present a demonstration from the 2007 hurricane season, developed within the Google Earth framework. A menu of imagery based sequential satellite overpasses (GOES and other geostationary satellites, TRMM, CloudSat, Terra, Aqua, DMSP, NOAA, QuikScat) during the storm lifecycle, are presented to the Earth client in an structured folder format. The remapping of these satellite data follows the hurricane track, enabling the user to view, animate, zoom, overlay and combine visible, infrared and passive microwave imagery and combine with other data (surface reports, forecasts, surface winds, ground and spaceborne radars, etc.) at various stages of the hurricane lifecycle. Pop-up balloons provide training that explains the properties and capabilities of the satellite datasets and what components of the underlying weather are represented. Future satellite overpass tracks are provided so that the user can anticipate imagery updates several days in advance (e.g., as a hurricane approaches landfall). This combination of geo-navigable data provides a convenient framework for efficiently demonstrating meteorological, oceanographic and weather and climate concepts to students, planners, and the public at large. http://www.nrlmry.navy.mil/NEXSAT.html
IN42A-07
Comparisons of Atmospheric Chemistry Models and Observational Data in Google Earth
We have developed a set of tools to enable Google Earth to support the scientific analysis of a chemistry and air quality field campaign in Mexico during spring of 2006. Using a variety of information types (gridded three- dimensional model results, surface observations and aircraft-based observations) we are able to provide the scientists with additional information on the overall structure of the chemical conditions at the time and location of the observations. Because the visualization is performed using Goggle Earth, the KML files produced can easily be distributed to the community. It is our goal that the tools we are building will enable the overall community (research and education) to access and visualize significant portions of the information available at the NCAR Community Data Portal.
IN42A-08
Utilizing Internet-based Community Collaboration Tools and Geobrowsers to Address Issues of Water Resource Sustainability
More frequently society is demanding that earth- and environmental-resource issues be evaluated and addressed by interdisciplinary investigators from the scientific, engineering, planning, and regulatory communities. Often these investigators are required to interact with a larger community of public stakeholders. Also, these investigators, by necessity, develop databases and models derived from disparate data sets that are often large, complex, and vary dramatically in scale and quality. The tools to facilitate the interactions of these communities of individuals have only recently garnered the appropriate sophistication to enable real-time data viewing, encoding, browsing, and modeling. At the same time, the advent of second-generation internet, or Web 2.0, technologies found in web-based communities and hosted services (such as social-networking, wikis, weblogs, social bookmarking, podcasts, and RSS web feeds) have fused with the more traditional two- and three-dimensional geographic information systems. This "mash-up" of web-based and stand-alone tools and services creates a highly interactive user environment that is favorable to real-time collaboration, community discussion, and broad public dissemination in a wide-area distributed network. These tools and services are being utilized to facilitate the investigations and conversations of scientists and other stakeholders addressing water resource sustainability issues in the desert southwestern United States. The data and models derived from these investigations are visualized using industry standard tools like ArcGIS, Google Earth, and Google Maps to enable ease-of-use by both the technical and the public stakeholder communities.