EOSDIS science community interface and advocacy

Abstract

The Earth Observing System (EOS), NASA's program to study the Earth from a global perspective, will provide the information and tools to further understanding of the environment of planet Earth. With greater knowledge of how natural and man-made forces impact the environment, informed policy makers can determine the most appropriate actions needed to preserve Earth's delicate life support system. A key to the success of EOS meeting mission objectives will be the Earth Observing System Data and Information System (EOSDIS). Sewing as a collaboratory, EOSDIS will enable interdisciplinary research on an unprecedented scale. By collecting and processing information from the EOS platforms and other spaceand earth-based instruments, EOSDIS will provide a world-class research information system in which scientists throughout the world can promptly access the data and previous research results needed to analyze and understand the processes of global change. To create this unique research environment, NASA, the science community, and industry must work closely together in the development of EOSDIS. The major design challenges of EOSDIS will be planning for system evolution to allow for growth and adaptation to new technologies and data sources; managing data diversity and volume; accommodating multidisciplinary users; and maintaining a largescale, distributed system that includes multiple instruments and platforms. Copyright O 1993 by Hughes Aircraft Co. Published by the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, Inc. with permission. EOSDIS encompasses a geographically distributed collection of institutional assets, plus the facilities and capabilities of the EOSDIS Core System (ECS), functioning in concert to support science. ECS is the overall integrating infrastructure for economical and effective operations of all the disparate system elements, providing the planning, scheduling, processing, and data management capabilities for EOS. Nature of EOS and EOSDIS-the need for user advocacy within the ECS Project NASA's Mission to Planet Earth is a concept that uses space and ground based measurement systems to provide the scientific basis for understanding global change. The Earth Observing System is the centerpiece of that concept. Spacebased, global observations of the land surface, biosphere, solid Earth, atmosphere, and oceans are provided by a series of satellites in polarorbiting and low inclination orbits. This long term series of observations will allow researchers to monitor climate variables over time, and to quantitatively determine environmental trends. However, observations alone are not sufficient to develop an understanding of global change. A comprehensive data and information system, a community of scientists performing research with the data acquired, and extensive ground campaigns are all important components. More than any other factor, the commitment to make Earth science data easily available to the research community proves critical to mission success. The EOS Data and Information System is that critical element of the EOS Program which provides the capability to retrieve, process, and distribute information and thereby serve the needs of scientists performing an integrated, multidisciplinary study of planet Earth. EOSDIS is a comprehensive Earth science research information system. It facilitates the extraction and exchange of scientific information from huge volumes of data. It promptly and reliably links a distributed science community to long-term data sets from EOS, other elements of Mission to Planet Earth, and in situ measurements, as well as to previous research results. It simplifies obtaining and manipulating Earth science information, enabling the worldwide science community to easily use diverse data, participate in mission operations, and interact with each other, from their respective laboratories. It schedules and controls EOS instruments and space platforms in accordance with the EOS Investigators Working Group (IWG), policies. It coordinates collection, processing, and data exchanges with international partners. It processes, maintains, and distributes the resulting data and information. In order to support the broadest possible community, EOSDIS must be service oriented and user friendly, responsive to community needs, and economically evolvable as needs and technologies change. It must accelerate near term scientific research using pre-EOS data, facilitating a growing understanding of global processes. EOSDIS will ultimately embrace the needs of a community broader than that of earth science; as such it will become a national and international resource of scientifically validated Earth science information and model results. It also will support broad socioeconomic policy analyses as well as the needs of education and policy research