IN53A-0946
Ordering Extensions for the Comprehensive Large Array Stewardship System, a Semantic and Metadata Schema for Diverse Data Types.
The Comprehensive Large Array Data Stewardship System (CLASS) is a NOAA wide data and information system covering many diverse data elements. The data currently served by CLASS cover a range from terrestrial weather to space and ocean and increasingly included modeled output as well as the observational data types. The development of ordering capabilities for these diverse data which are presented to a clientele from unique backgrounds has precipitated the need for data models, structures, and semantic mappings which cover many disciplines. We will present our CLASS developed ordering extensions and discuss how these relate to extant community standards. In particular we will discuss the semantic mapping necessary to present the data across a broad user base and how the work done may be relevant to other community efforts. http://www.class.noaa.gov
IN53A-0947
Information Semantic Tools for Coastal Data Management
In a coastal disaster event, it is necessary to obtain information about water level (depth), winds, currents, waves, temperature-salinity stratification in real time and predictions of water level (12-24 hrs), storm surge (48-72 hours) in advance. It has been estimated that better preparation, response, and mitigation will reduce average costs of storm-related disasters by 10%. The dissemination of information that is time critical calls for systems that will facilitate quick assessment of the scenario from multiple perspectives. Sensor data are obtained from a multitude of distributed sensor networks. Our current work funded by Northern Gulf Institute (NGI) on Sensor Web tools for coastal buoys based on OGC sensor web enablement framework enables the use of real or near real time data derived from coastal sensor networks and dynamic selection and aggregation of multiple sensor systems, meteorological and oceanographic simulations and other decision support systems in a web services- based environment. In addition, we pursue the semantic web approaches to understand the context of the data, resolve the meaning, interpretation or usage of the same or related data and develop knowledge-based tools for access to the information sources. Observations from satellites provide a variety of measurements that are not otherwise available or affordable. However, the use of such valuable information in a rapid assessment scenario is hindered by the fact that it is cumbersome to explore huge image databases through manual or semi automated methods. The Rapid Image information mining (RIIM) tool that we developed for this purpose is demonstrated with imagery data from Landsat ETM+ of post Katrina hurricane.
IN53A-0948
Standardizing orbit planning, satellite operations, and communication activities that are affected by space weather
Precision satellite orbit determination, constellation station-keeping, debris avoidance, reentry timing, satellite subsystem performance and safety, and communication link enhancement are among the major technological activities that are affected by space weather. There are numerous applications being developed to mitigate space weather affects on these domains. However, the common language for information exchange still needs community attention. We report on progress towards a) providing applications and services that mitigate adverse effects caused by space weather and b) developing international standards for exchange of information. For applications and services, Space Environment Technologies (SET) has developed a) new solar indices that reduce 1-sigma uncertainty by 50 percent in atmosphere density calculations, b) new spacecraft surface charging characterizations, and c) new solar irradiances that capture solar flare effects on transionospheric communications. These solar products have been developed and tested for: 1) daily time resolution for historical, nowcast, and intermediate-term forecast periods (1-day granularity, 1-hour cadence, and 1-hour latency extending 4.5 months); 2) high time resolution for recent, nowcast, and short-term forecast periods (3-hour granularity, 1-hour cadence, and 1-hour latency extending 96 hours); and 3) precision time resolution for recent, current epoch, and near-term forecast periods (1-minute granularity, 2-minute cadence, and 5-minute latency extending 6 hours). These indices and solar irradiances are used for improving atmosphere density and ionosphere models' outputs and we describe specific case studies as well as coupled applications that serve space systems users in orbit planning, satellite operations, and communication activities. For standards, we report on the activities of ISO TC20/SC14/WG4, which has the authority to develop international standards related to the space environment. http://SpaceWx.com
IN53A-0949
The GeoSciML Logical Model
GeoSciML is being developed as an interchange language for geoscience. The initial scope has been designed to include the information generally shown on geological maps, and some observations, in particular using boreholes. The logical model has been built in UML and the model includes packages for mapped features, geologic units, earth material and geologic structures. The model inherits from GML, for spatial information, and observations and measurements (O&M) in particular. At present the scope of the model is largely interpreted information, but the intention is to extend it to include more observational data. A ‘mapped feature' can be considered an occurrence, such as a polygon on a geologic map, of a real-world geologic feature the full extent of which is unknown. Geologic features are associated with geologic events for recording their age, process and environment of formation. The two main types of geologic feature modelled are geologic units and geologic structures. Geologic units have specialisations for lithostratigraphic units, lithodemic units, chronostratigraphic units and deformation units, but more will be added in the future as required. The model allows for composite geologic units, made up of other geologic units, to be described. Geologic structures include fractures, shear displacement structures, contacts, fold and foliation. The earth material package allows for the description of both individual components such as minerals and compound materials such as rocks or unconsolidated material. The model incorporates a structure for controlled concepts which can be defined in terms of normative descriptions of geologic units or earth materials. These can be built into geologic vocabularies, such as stratigraphic lexicons. Two data types of particular use in describing geologic properties have been defined: one allows properties to be recorded with term, number and range values along with a qualifier property for handling the ‘fuzziness' of much geologic data; another, ‘geometric description' data type, allows for the recording of linear and planar structural measurements along with a code for the recording convention used eg ‘right hand rule'. The GeoSciML data model has been developed by the CGI Interoperability Working Group http://www.seegrid.csiro.au/twiki/bin/view/CGIModel/GeoSciML
IN53A-0950
A Semantic Web-based Methodology for Building Conceptual Models of Scientific Information
We have designed, developed, and deployed a number of applications that leverage ontologies in interdisciplinary scientific applications. As our work has evolved, we have developed a methodology for leveraging semantic technologies as kind of methodology for building and deploying semantically-enhanced science community applications. We will present our semantic web methodology that has been used in science applications covering Solar Terrestrial Physics, Atmospheric Research, Volcanology, and Plate Tectonics applications, among others. The methodology includes use case generation, carefully chosen mixed skill-set teams, use case analysis, development of a conceptual model, semantic tool usage, expert review and iteration, leveraging of technological infrastructure, rapid prototyping, and open world evolution, iteration, redesign, and redeployment. In this presentation, we will show how the methodology has been used in our projects and highlight benefits including quick deployment and rapid community buy-in.
IN53A-0951
MMI: Increasing Community Collaboration
Building community requires a collaborative environment and guidance to help move members towards a common goal. An effective environment for community collaboration is a workspace that fosters participation and cooperation; effective guidance furthers common understanding and promotes best practices. The Marine Metadata Interoperability (MMI) project has developed a community web site to provide a collaborative environment for scientists, technologists, and data managers from around the world to learn about metadata and exchange ideas. Workshops, demonstration projects, and presentations also provide community-building opportunities for MMI. MMI has developed comprehensive online guides to help users understand and work with metadata standards, ontologies, and other controlled vocabularies. Documents such as "The Importance of Metadata Standards", "Usage vs. Discovery Vocabularies" and "Developing Controlled Vocabularies" guide scientists and data managers through a variety of metadata-related concepts. Members from eight organizations involved in marine science and informatics collaborated on this effort. The MMI web site has moved from Plone to Drupal, two content management systems which provide different opportunities for community-based work. Drupal's "organic groups" feature will be used to provide workspace for future teams tasked with content development, outreach, and other MMI mission-critical work. The new site is designed to enable members to easily create working areas, to build communities dedicated to developing consensus on metadata and other interoperability issues. Controlled-vocabulary-driven menus, integrated mailing-lists, member-based content creation and review tools are facets of the new web site architecture. This move provided the challenge of developing a hierarchical vocabulary to describe the resources presented on the site; consistent and logical tagging of web pages is the basis of Drupal site navigation. The new MMI web site presents enhanced opportunities for electronic discussions, focused collaborative work, and even greater community participation. The MMI project is beginning a new initiative to comprehensively catalog and document tools for marine metadata. The new MMI community-based web site will be used to support this work and to support the work of other ad-hoc teams in the future. We are seeking broad input from the community on this effort. http://marinemetadata.org/agucommunity
IN53A-0952
Helio-informatics: Preparing for the Future of Heliophysics Research
The rapidly growing data volumes for space-bourne and ground-based observatories for the Sun and heliosphere will soon make it impractical, costly, and effectively impossible for researchers to download and locally inspect substantial portions of the data archives. By the end of 2008, for example, the Solar Dynamics Observatory will downlink over 2TB/day of compressed data; such a large volume would readily saturate internet connections to the archive site if it were exported to a handful of researchers around the world. We envision a revolution in research methodology towards a mode in which researchers run autonomous event- finding algorithms at a primary data archive in order to preselect relatively small subsets of the data that can subsequently be inspected and analyzed in detail at a researcher's home institution. Teams from the SDO, Hinode, STEREO, and TRACE missions are developing the infrastructure that is needed to make this into a useful research tool: we are defining standardized event attributes compatible with the Virtual Observatory and EGSO concepts and developing a knowledge base supported by a web-based tool for compound queries based on the contents of solar and heliospheric observations. More information on our plans, target dates, and contact information can be found at the URL below. The Helio-informatics project is being developed with support from the HINODE /SOT (NNM07AA01C), SDO/AIA (NNG04EA00C), STEREO/SECCHI (N00173-02-C-2035), and TRACE (NAS5-38099) science investigations. http://www.lmsal.com/helio- informatics/hpkb/