e-Science
Solid Earth e-Science
Advances in Information Science Technology (IST) are producing high performance computing networks and advanced web-based computational and visualization tools. EPOS will implement many of the emerging IST developments to create an e-infrastructure for geosciences to facilitate broad use of the Earth science research infrastructure and open up new approaches to scientific research.
A major Earth science data challenge
EPOS faces a major data handling challenge. The amount of primary data, and the demand for access to them, is enormous, and increasing, and existing data archiving and exchange philosophies and procedures are inadequate. Multidisciplinary scientific research is often hampered by limited access to the large and diverse data volumes needed to make progress (including, for example, geophysical, geological, topographic, and sea level data).
An EPOS objective is to create a comprehensive, easily accessible geo-data volume for the entire European plate at resolutions appropriate to the scale (and socio-economic importance) of issues under investigation.
EPOS will ensure secure storage of geophysical and geological data providing the continued commitment needed for long-term observation of the Earth.
Computational and modelling facilities
Modelling and processing of huge data volumes and visualisation of results will play a central role in testing new scientific hypotheses. EPOS will rely on the world leading European expertise in modelling solid Earth processes developed in national and international projects and in existing European-scale initiatives to promote computational Research Infrastructures including EU-HPC (or PRACE http://www.praceproject.eu) and EGEE (http://public.eu-egee.org/).
EPOS will invest in the development of e-infrastructures to serve a broad audience of Earth scientists, benefiting from the experience gained in other projects and by organizations. The e-infrastructure will include:
- Web portals for data distribution, data mining and archiving, connected to Grid-based computing facilities
- Standardized protocols or protocol services for data exchange
- Web services for integration of new sensors, instruments, observatories and laboratories into the infrastructure
- Repositories for raw observational and experimental data, modelling/simulation data, data products, and meta-data
- Repositories for data assimilation, modelling and visualization tools