CSIG 10Survey of Emerging IT Trends

and Technologies

Chaitan Baru

SDSC

1

Cyberinfrastructure• The “cyberinfrastructure” initiative is an attempt to provide explicit

investments in IT for science & engineering research and education

• From NSF’s Cyberinfrastructure Vision for 21st Century Discovery, www.nsf.gov/od/oci/ci-v7.pdf, July 20, 2006

– “The comprehensive infrastructure needed to capitalize on dramatic advances in information technology has been termed cyberinfrastructure.”

– “…integrates hardware for computing, data and networks, digitally-enabled sensors, observatories and experimental facilities…:

– “…an interoperable suite of software and middleware services and tools...”

– Investments in interdisciplinary teams and cyberinfrastructure professionals with expertise in algorithm development, system operations, and applications development are also essential…”

– “In 1999, the PITAC released the seminal report ITR-Investing in our Future, prompting new and complementary NSF investments in CI projects, such as the Grid Physics Network (GriPhyN) and international Virtual Data Grid Laboratory (iVDGL) and the Geosciences Network, known as GEON.”

2

Geoinformatics

• A vision for Geoinformatics, from the NSF Workshop on Envisioning a National Geoinformatics System for the United States Denver, March 2007– “…a future in which someone can sit at a

terminal and have easy access to vast stores of data of almost any kind, with the easy ability to visualize, analyze and model those data.”

3

4

GeoinformaticsFrom David Lambert, NSF EAR/GEO

Presentation at GEON Annual Meeting, 2005

GeoinformaticsCyberinfrastructure for the Solid

Earth Sciences: Objectives

• Make data, tools, applications

…and communities…

easily accessible online

• Provide an integration environment for 3D and 4D geoscience data integration

Book to be published this year by Cambridge University Press. Co-editors: Randy Keller and Chaitan Baru

5

A Use Case for Geoinformatics

6

• A user request of the form:

“For a given region (i.e. lat/long extent, plus depth), return a 3D structural model with accompanying physical parameters of density, seismic velocities, geochemistry, and geologic ages, using a cell size of 10km”

Portal-based Science EnvironmentsSupport for resource sharing and collaborations

EarthScope Data Portal

- SDSC San Diego

- IRIS Seattle

- UNAVCO Boulder

- ICDP Potsdam

portal.earthscope.org

CUAHSI Hydrologic Information System, HIS (http://his.cuahsi.org)

– Data Discovery, Data Access, Data Publication

9

GEON: Geosciences Network*

10

• Funded by NSF IT Research program

• Multi-institution collaboration between IT and Earth Science researchers

• GEON Cyberinfrastructure provides:– Authenticated access to data and Web services

– Registration of data sets, tools, and services with metadata

– Search for data, tools, and services, using ontologies

– Scientific workflow environment and access to HPC

– Data and map integration capability

– Scientific data visualization and GIS mapping* The network / grid concept has been evolving over past several years

GEON: The Geosciences Network

GEON is a coalition among IT and Earth Science researchers with the goal of developing advanced information technologies to enable new modes of geosciences research GEON is developing technologies for information integration and knowledge discovery Project participants: 14 PI institutions, and partners including, other projects, agencies, and industry GEON has deployed a Web services-based, distributed computing infrastructure, called the GEONgrid, across PI and partner sites GEONgrid provides access to data collections, tools, and applications that support geosciences research Project funding: $11.25M, 2002-2007

www.geongrid.org

RESEARCH AND EDUCATION PRODUCTS AND RESULTS

Technologies for Ontology-Based Data Registration, GIS Map Integration, Distributed Portals, and 4D Visualization

Research on 3D Lithospheric structure Gravity Modeling Remote Sensing Data Integration

Cyberinfrastructure Summer Institute for Geoscientists and graduate courses in Geoinformatics

• 14 PI institutions• Over 20 other partners including, universities, industry, government agencies/labs

GEON Partners

PI Institutions

• Arizona State University

• Bryn Mawr College

• Penn State University

• Rice University

• San Diego State University

• San Diego Supercomputer Center/UCSD

• University of Arizona

• University of Idaho

• University of Missouri, Columbia

• University of Texas at El Paso

• University of Utah

• Virginia Tech

• UNAVCO

• Digital Library for Earth System Education (DLESE)

Partners

• Chronos

• CUAHSI-HIS

• ESRI

• Calit2

• Georgia State University

• Geological Survey of Canada

• Georeference Online

• HP

• IBM

• Lawrence Livermore Natl Laboratory

• NASA Goddard, Earth System Division

• SCEC

• U.S. Geological Survey (USGS)

• Purdue University

Affiliated Projects

• EarthScope, IRIS

Key Informatics Areas• Portals

– Authenticated, role-based access to cyber resources: data, tools, models, model outputs, collaboration spaces, …

• Data Integration– Search, discovery and integration of data from heterogeneous information sources

(“mediation” and “semantic integration”)

• Use of workflow systems, and access to HPC– Ability to “program” at a higher level of abstraction– Sharing of models, along with “provenance” information– Gateways to HPC environments

• Management of Geospatial Information– Using GIS capabilities, map services, geospatial data integration

• Visualization of 3D, 4D geospatial data and information

GEON Portalportal.geongrid.org

14

• Generic Capabilities:– Search

– Workbench

– Dynamic map services, map integration

• Applications:– Paleo database integration

– LiDAR data access and data processing

– SYNSEIS: Online access to computational modeling system

– Gravity and Magnetic database for US

GEON and Related Portals

EarthScope

CUAHSI Hydrologic Information System

Chesapeake Bay Environmental Observatory National Ecological Observatory Network Prototype

Tropical Ecology Assessment and Monitoring Network

Data Search and Integration

GEON LiDAR Workflow (GLW) Portlet

GEON Project and Funding Structure

18

GEON

GEON Portal

OpenTopographyOpenEarth Framework

• NSF ITR

NSF Geoinformatics

NSF EAR/IF Facility (GEO, OCI, CISE) • OCI Software Development for

Cyberinfrastructure (SDCI)

CluENSF CluE (GEO, CISE)

Integrated Cyberinfrastructure System Source: Dr. Deborah Crawford, Chair, NSF CI Working Committee

19

Hardware

Middleware Services

DevelopmentTools & Libraries

Application Domains• Geosciences, Engineering, Environmental Sciences, Physics, Astronomy, Archaeology, Neurosciences, Biomedicine, …

Domain-specific Cybertools (software)

Domain-specific Cybertools (software)

Shared Cybertools (software)

Shared Cybertools (software)

Distributed Resources (computation, storage, communication, etc.)

Distributed Resources (computation, storage, communication, etc.)

Ed

uca

tion a

nd

Tra

inin

g

Dis

covery

& In

novati

on

Friendly Work-Facilitating Portals

Authentication - Authorization – Auditing - Resource Discovery - Workflows - Visualization - Analysis

20

Community Cyberinfrastructure Projects

Middleware Services

DevelopmentTools & Libraries

Distributed Computing, Instruments and Data Resources

Bio

med

ical

In

form

atic

s (B

IRN

)

Hig

h E

neg

y P

hys

ics

(Gri

Ph

yN)

Geo

scie

nce

s (G

EO

N)

Eco

log

ical

Ob

serv

ato

ries

(N

EO

N)

Ear

thq

uak

e E

ng

inee

rin

g (

NE

ES

)

Oce

an O

bse

rvin

g (

OR

ION

)

HardwareSource: Prof. Mark Ellisman, UC San Diego

Shared Tools ScienceDomains

Shared Tools ScienceDomains

Your Specific Tools

& User Apps.

Your Specific Tools

& User Apps.

Services implied by the Geoinformatics use case

21

“For a given region (i.e. lat/long extent, plus depth), return a 3D structural model with accompanying physical parameters of density, seismic velocities, geochemistry, and geologic ages, using a cell size of 10km”

Services implied by the use case1. Search and discovery

2. Data access

3. Data integration, including transformations, model execution, and visualization

4. Result publication (and preservation—so that results can be searched and discovered)

22

All in a distributed environment

google,

bing,..?Grid

computingsupercompu

ters

Some

database

technologie

sSome scientific visualization

Digital libraries and archives

Data “integration”

• A priori integration– Consistent metadata and data standards and data

“schema”/structure, and semantics are pre-defined across a set of data resources

– User simply issues a query and receives a result

versus• Ad hoc integration

– Consistent standards for discovery and data access, but retrieved data are visualized in a common environment and user interactively integrates the data

23

Evolution of distributed environments

• Mainframes – with distributed “synchronous” terminals

• Networked minicomputers – with proprietary computer networking

protocols

• The Web– Engineering workstations with open

communications protocols

24

Evolution of distributed environments

• The Grid– Distributed computational and storage

resources owned by organizations, orchestrated together to form “metacomputers”

• The Cloud– On-demand computational and storage

resources provided as a service over the Internet, with incremental cost models

25

Clients in a distributed environment

• “Dumb” terminals– IBM 3270, vt100

• “Thick” clients– Workstations as clients in a client-server system

• “Thin” clients– Original PC desktops

• Thick clients– Modern PCs with powerful capabilities (64-bit, multicore, large

memory)

• Thin clients– Mobile devices

26

Distributed environments…contd.

• Service-oriented architecture, SOA– A programming style for distributed computing– Services may be distributed in wide area

(Internet scale) – or local area (within a datacenter)

• Data inertia– Moving data to computation vs– Computation to data

27

Virtual Organizations (VOs)

• A socio-technical concept

• A distributed collection of entities and resources that come together to solve a specific problem– Multiple participants

– Distributed sites

– Participants are from different “administrative domains”

– Policies, rules, systems of the VO may be different than those of the participating organizations

• Requires agreement on basics standards and protocols to enable resource and data sharing

28

Other Geoinformatics Efforts• OneGeology.org

– International initiative of geological surveys to create dynamic geological map data available via the web.

• USGS initiative– Presentation by Dr. Linda

Gundersen, at Geoinformatics 2007, San Diego.

29

USGS: 1000’s of National USGS: 1000’s of National and Regional Databasesand Regional Databases

The National Map – topographic, The National Map – topographic, elevation, orthoimagery, elevation, orthoimagery, transportation hydrography etc.transportation hydrography etc.

Geospatial One Stop-portalGeospatial One Stop-portal MRDATA – Mineral Resources and MRDATA – Mineral Resources and

Related DataRelated Data The National Geologic Map Database The National Geologic Map Database

stnadardized community collection of stnadardized community collection of geologic mappinggeologic mapping

National Water Information System - National Water Information System - NWISWebNWISWeb

National Geochemical Survey National Geochemical Survey Database (PLUTO, NURE)Database (PLUTO, NURE)

National Geophysical Database National Geophysical Database (aeromag, gravity, aerorad)(aeromag, gravity, aerorad)

Earthquake CatalogsEarthquake Catalogs North American Breeding Bird SurveyNorth American Breeding Bird Survey National Vegetation/speciation mapsNational Vegetation/speciation maps National Oil and Gas AssessmentNational Oil and Gas Assessment National Coal Quality InventoryNational Coal Quality InventorySource: Presentation by Dr. Linda Gundersen, USGS, at Geoinformatics

2007, San Diego, CA.

USGIN: Geoscience Information Network

31