US-EU Research CooperationInteragency/International Cooperation

on Ecoinformatics

September 2004

Bruce Bargmeyer+1 (510) 495-2905bebargmeyer@lbl.gov

Interagency/International Cooperation on EcoinformaticsBrussels, Belgium

2

Ecoinformatics

Information science and information technology for the environment

Sound information as the basis for environmental policy, decisions, and action

Information technology that supports and enables development of sound information

Facilitate interaction with the information Human – Computer Computer - Computer

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Ecoinformatics

What are the key elements needed for an ecoinformatics marketplace?

What actions should this Interagency/ International Cooperation on Ecoinformatics take?

How can the I/ICE contribute to and draw on R&D programs of NSF, & EU DGs?

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Past, Present, … Future?

Lots of users Lots of information systems

Lots of DataSources

UsersUsers

EEA

DOE

DoD

EPAenvironagricultureclimatehuman healthindustrytourismsoilwaterair

123345445670248591308

123345445670248591308

3268082513485038270800002178

3268082513485038270800002178

text data

environagricultureclimatehuman healthindustrytourismsoilwaterair

123345445670248591308

123345445670248591308

3268082513485038270800002178

3268082513485038270800002178

text

ambienteagriculturatiemposalud hunanoindustriaturismotierraaguaaero

123345445670248591308

123345445670248591308

3268082513485038270800002178

3268082513485038270800002178

text data

data

environagricultureclimatehuman healthindustrytourismsoilwaterair

123345445670248591308

123345445670248591308

3268082513485038270800002178

3268082513485038270800002178

text data

Others . . .

ambienteagriculturatiemposalud hunoindustriaturismotierraaguaaero

123345445670248591308

123345445670248591308

3268082513485038

3268082513485038270800002178

text data

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Actions

Much is already being done on environmental & health information Billions are being spent on data, systems, analysis Millions are being spent on information technology Millions are being spent on standards Millions being spent on semantics development and

data harmonization

We can have great influence in bringing coherence to these expenditures/efforts with a tiny fraction of these funds.

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Data Standards

Avoid a combinatorial explosion of data content, description, and metadata arrangements for information access and exchange. Data standards and metadata registries can help.

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State Laws

CAA

CWA

RCRA

TSCA

“

“

State Regs

Fed Air Reg

Fed Water Reg

Fed RCRA Reg

Fed TSCA Reg

“

“

SeparateData

Repositories

RegulatedFacility

SeparateRegs/

Procedures

SeparateEnvironmental

MediaLegislation

Then there is one point of access to our environmental data resources:

CompleteWarehouseRepository

RegulatedFacility

Public/Environmental

Regulators/Environmental

Community

June 1996

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Data and Semantics Management

DictionaryKeyword

Keyword

OntologyOntology TermsTerms

DataDataElementsElements

Thesaurus

DBMS/XML/ Documents

Semantic

Web Concepts

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Possible Actions

Identify and develop ecoinformatics key elements Lead semantics development efforts and provide

semantic services Lead standards efforts

E.g., for Reportnet, the Exchange Network, GBIF Lead adaptation/adoption of emerging technology

Environmental semantic grid Environmental data grid Environmental computational grid

Hardware cycles Software/models

Metadata Registries

Companies

Universities

Agencies

DataServices

SemanticServices

Others

UsersUsers

September 2004

En

viro

nm

enta

l D

ata

Gri

d

Environmental Computer GridHigh Performance, cluster, Personal

Environmental SemanticsGrid

Terminology Thesaurus Ontology Taxonomy

StructuredMetadata

ComputationServices

Software:Models, Visualization, AnalysisAgent systemsSemantic Based Computing

DataStandards

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Metadata Registries

Companies

Universities

Agencies

DataServices

SemanticServices

Others

UsersUsers

September 2004

En

viro

nm

enta

l D

ata

Gri

d

Environmental Computer GridHigh Performance, cluster, Personal

Environmental SemanticsGrid

Terminology Thesaurus Ontology Taxonomy

StructuredMetadata

ComputationServices

Software:Models, Visualization, AnalysisAgent systemsSemantic Based Computing

DataStandards

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A Possible Collaborative Project

Initiate an interconnected EU-US: Environmental Data Grid Environmental Computation Grid Environmental Semantics Grid

Organize key infrastructure components for demonstration E.g., EDR, EPA supercomputer, models DOE/LBNL supercomputer (under DOE-EPA MOU) XMDR Semantics Server Interagency semantic and data resources e.g., GBIF

Hold competition for innovative use of the Grids. Organize conference(s) Funding: $50m over three years Seed money for organizing $300k each in US in EU Possible funding for workshop

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US – EU Collaboration

US NSF EPA and I/ICE partners

EU DG Environment, DG Research, DG Information Society EEA

R&D Lead and Project Central US – LBNL EU – JRC

Private firms

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Application Areas

Biodiversity Climate Genomics computational toxicology Spatial data – GEO/GEOS & GMES Ecological Modeling Security, ecological risk management Invasive species-industrial costs

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Related Efforts

Semantic Environment for Ecological Knowledge (SEEK)

Knowledge Network for Biocomplexity (KNB) DataGrid Project (FP5) Environmental Cyber Infrastructure DOE Science Grid Cancer Biomedical Informatics Grid (caBIG)

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Example Tasks

Production Grid Services Develop the components necessary to use Grids in production.

Define Grid-capable Web services standards, develop concrete implementations of Grid services, participate in interoperability testing between different Grid service implementations, and implement production Grids (see: DOE Production Science Grid).

Grid Services Architecture Develop an architecture which supports dynamic, programmatic

access to local and remote data sources and metadata repositories without sacrificing the high-performance requirement. E.g., address this problem through a peer-to-peer service infrastructure which supports queries across autonomous data repositories, including dynamic and heterogeneous information sources.

Security/Authentication/Access Control Develop secure grid technologies e.g., authorization services for

heterogeneous, widely distributed resources that require a combination of local and centralized access control. Apply these principles of policy-based access control both to group query protocols and to individual peer-to-peer data sharing responses.

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Example Tasks (Cont)

Grid Workflow Many scientific projects have developed workflows which are regularly

used in their research. Develop a graphical user interface for composition and monitoring of Grid-based workflows. E.g., enable scientists to design workflow networks by “dragging and dropping” existing Grid service components and monitoring the resulting workflow execution visually. Enable end users to submit complex queries through a friendly Web interface, while also allowing the production Grid managers to execute and monitor regularly scheduled complex, compute- and data-intensive production workflows.

Collaboration Technologies Distributed scientific collaborations need tools to support development of

topical communities of researchers working together regardless of actual physical location. E.g, Pervasive Collaborative Computing Environment (PCCE).

Semantic Grids A Semantic Grid adapts the Semantic Web and metadata registries to the

service-oriented architecture being used to develop next-generation Grid services.

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Some Precedents

Cancer Bioinformatics Grid (caBIG) – expected funding $20m each year for three years Includes the caDSR (a ISO/IEC 11179

metadata registry like the EDR)

DOE Competition for Supercomputer time

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Organizational Meeting

Berkeley, California January 18 & 19, 2005 (Tue & Wed)Host: LBNLLocation UC Berkeley CampusAttendance: 25 or less

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Workshop: Statement of Purpose

E.g., Environmental science involves many collaborators at multiple

institutions. The leading edge of science depends critically on an infrastructure that supports widely distributed computing, data, and instrument resources. An Environmental Science Grid is being developed and deployed across the Environmental organizations, providing infrastructure services for advanced scientific applications and problem solving frameworks. By reducing barriers to the use of remote resources, it is deploying the cyber infrastructure required for the next generation of science.

The goal of the Environmental Science Grid project is to provide this advanced cyber infrastructure as persistent, scalable, community standards based, Grid services to support environmental science projects. Grid services provide security, resource discovery, resource access, monitoring, data access, tools for advanced scientific applications and problem solving frameworks. These services reduce barriers to the use of remote resources and facilitate large-scale collaboration.