DDE Newsletter Issue 02, January 2023

Editor’s note

Welcome to the second of DDE’s regular newsletters. In this edition we have details of the 9 November 2022 Open Science Forum convened by Deep-time Digital Earth (DDE) at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris, accounts of exciting new projects in development, and reports of some of the DDE working and task groups.

Mike Stephenson, Newsletter Editor

[Prof Mike Stephenson was President of the IUGS Deep-time Digital Earth programme between 2019 and 2021. He was instrumental in founding the DDE initiative developing its statutes and byelaws and chairing the early meetings of the Governing Council. Mike has 25 years’ experience in energy and geological science and research, including 8 years national level science leadership as the UK’s chief geologist (Executive Chief Scientist and Director of Science and Technology of the British Geological Survey).Mike is currently Editor of the DDE Newsletter and Director of DDE Europe/Middle East.]

DDE Open Science Forum

On 9 November 2022, the Deep-time Digital Earth (DDE) Open Science Forum was convened in Salle II at UNESCO Headquarters, Paris to promote dialogue among earth and data scientists, and representatives of several international organizations and UNESCO Member States on how DDE could support the implementation of the UNESCO Open Science Recommendation.

DDE is a big science initiative launched by the International Union of Geological Sciences (IUGS), one of the world’s largest scientific unions that is commemorating its 60th anniversary in 2022. The Forum is recognized as an activity within the framework of the International Year of Basic Sciences for Sustainable Development (IYBSSD) being celebrated in 2022.

DDE promotes a data driven research paradigm for the generation of insights and knowledge critical for UN Member States to reach sustainable development goals. Endorsed by IUGS in late 2018, the early years of growth of DDE have been constrained by travel and communication restrictions that have prevailed since the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in early 2020. The DDE Open Science Forum, co-organized by UNESCO, IUGS, IYBSSD and DDE, was the formal global launch of DDE as IUGS’ first ever big-science initiative.

Prof Chengshan Wang and Dr. Shamila Nair-Bedouelle, Assistant Director General (ADG) for the Natural Sciences at UNESCO

Prof. John Ludden, President of IUGS opened the Forum and invited Dr. Shamila Nair-Bedouelle, Assistant Director General (ADG) for the Natural Sciences in UNESCO to address Forum attendees. Dr. Nair-Bedouelle stressed the importance of the implementation of the UNESCO Open Science Recommendation and welcomed the interest of DDE to contribute by promoting data driven research and development in the earth sciences. She called upon earth scientists to make their data, information and knowledge societally relevant and contribute to UN efforts to assist Member States to reach sustainable development goals. She highlighted the need to focus on participation of women, small island development states (SIDS) and African scientists in the implementation of the UNESCO Open Science Recommendation.

Dr. Shamila Nair-Bedouelle addressing the forum

Prof. Michel Spiro, Chair of IYBSSD, in his opening remarks described the importance of geology and other basic sciences in international cooperation for sustainable development. He explained the motives and reasons for the launch of the International Year of Basic Sciences for Sustainable Development (IYBSSD) and expressed his pleasure in recognizing DDE Open Science Forum as an IYBSSD event.

Prof. Jennifer McKinley, Chair of the Governing Council (GC) of DDE, thanked UNESCO, IUGS and IYBSSD for joining hands with DDE in co-organizing this global launch of DDE. Prof. McKinley informed Forum participants that despite the constraints experienced by all parts of the world during the global pandemic, DDE has grown and made significant contributions to international cooperation in data driven research. DDE now includes 24 members, 27 working and task groups and a number of partner organizations contributing to implementing DDE projects and initiatives; DDE funded 3 projects in 2021 and is expected to finance an additional 3-5 projects under a seed grant fund set up in 2022; the DDE Platform had been officially launched the day before the Forum during the 5th meeting of the DDE Governing Council (GC) and is now open for use by scientists from all parts of the world for data driven research; a research center of excellence (RCE) has been opened in Suzhou, China and is open to hosting post-doctoral fellows from all parts of the world. DDE also welcomed UNESCO Member States to consider establishing RCEs in all parts of the world.

Prof Chengshan Wang, Chair of the Executive Committee of DDE, speaking at the forum

Following the opening remarks of UNESCO, IYBSSD and DDE representatives, 4, 1-hour technical sessions were convened:

In session 1, on Implementing Open Science Recommendation with FAIR (findable, accessible, interoperable and reusable) principles, H.E. Ms. Ramata Bakayoko-Ly, Ambassador and Permanent Delegate of Cote d’Ivoire described the process that led to UNESCO’s adoption of the Open Science Recommendation. She then highlighted progress in implementation of so far particularly in Africa, including in her own country, Cote d’Ivoire. Prof. John Ludden presented IUGS activities to commemorate the organization’s 60th anniversary in 2022 and their relevance to implementing the UNESCO Open Science Recommendation. He informed the Forum of IUGS’ recognition of the first 100 geological heritage sites of the world; some of them could be venues for Open Science initiatives. Prof. Chengshan Wang, Chair of the Executive Committee of DDE described how DDE, since it started activities in 2019, has contributed to implementing the 4 pillars of the UNESCO Open Science Recommendation: he highlighted the launch of the DDE Platform for scientists to share data and knowledge under FAIR principles as a landmark achievement of DDE. He outlined some DDE initiatives on infrastructure and capacity building through DDE RCEs and projects financed by DDE. During the discussion that followed the three presentations, a representative of the UNESCO Category 2 Centre, in Kinshasa, DRC, invited DDE to consider establishing an RCE for Africa in that Centre.

In session 2, on Geosciences contributions to emerging global environmental and development challenges, Prof. Qiuming Cheng, past President of IUGS and the holder of the UNESCO Chair on Digital Earth and Mineralogy provided a keynote address on “Geosciences for Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)”. He emphasized that geological data has been critical for understanding evolution of climate, geographies, life and materials. He provided case studies to demonstrate the use of computer aided data analyses on distribution, availability, quality of mineral resources. Three panelists provided brief commentaries based on Qiuming’s keynote address and their own work. Sven Renner from the World Bank informed the Forum participants how his team on extractive industries, i.e., fossil fuels, minerals etc., increasingly rely on data to minimize carbon footprints of extraction projects: Olivier Peyret from Schlumberger, France, briefly spoke about the history of his company’s long-standing interest on data and measurement. He highlighted his company’s work with Open Science Data Universe (OSDU), which enjoys widespread acceptance in the industrial sector. Prof Mike Stephenson, Director of DDE for Europe and the Middle East stressed that natural resources development in developing countries, particularly in Africa must become more data driven and the DDE Platform could help such countries to collaborate with scientists from developed countries. During discussions, ADG/SC, Shamila Nair-Bedouelle, welcomed and invited DDE and its partners to assist less developed countries in Africa to develop skills and capacities to benefit from data platforms such as that launched by DDE as well as others, including those established by private sector enterprises like Schlumberger.

Session 2, on Geosciences contributions to emerging global environmental and development challenges

In session 3 on DDE Platform: infrastructure, data sharing and data science tools, there were three keynote presentations. The first one from Prof. Jian Wang illustrated the value of the cloud-based DDE Platform to the entire DDE community of scientists. He provided examples to showcase the very high speeds and lower costs of computation of cloud-based platforms in comparison to that are based on others. In his view there is a lot of synergy between what DDE Platform could offer and the expectations of the implementation of the UNESCO Open Science Recommendation. Prof. Rob Hazen used his studies on “mineral ecology” and his research on predicting distribution of mineral species in land surfaces on earth and other planets as an example to illustrate how massive datasets in combination with cloud based analytical options generate new insights and knowledge that were unimaginable in the past. Prof. Junxuan Fan, in the third keynote presentation, showed how the combination of supercomputers, algorithms and massive fossil and stratigraphic datasets have made it possible to significantly improve the time resolution of biodiversity evolution during earth’s history. Simon Hudson, the CEO of CODATA, one the world’s earliest data driven international cooperation initiative and a Vice-Chair of the international group of experts that drafted the UNESCO Open Science Recommendation, expressed his interest in collaborating with DDE on FAIR data principles and their applications.

In session 4, on Geo-literacy: raising public awareness and societal relevance of geological sciences, Dr. Daven Quinn presented a keynote address where he noted that geological concepts are not always presented in a way that the public could understand and appreciate. He encouraged linking geo-science teaching at all levels to address societal issues such as natural hazards and geological sites of interest. Geological knowledge and understanding are necessary for addressing human impacts and responding to climate change. This keynote was followed by 3 panelists expressing their own views on the theme of the session. Dr. Silvia Peppeloni, outlined the growing interest in geo-ethics, particularly in relation to sharing data and geosciences knowledge of importance to addressing and resolving issues linked to sustainable development. Patricio Villafane noted that not all countries have technologies to access the vast volumes of data that are being generated. He expressed the hope that Open Science initiatives like that launched by UNESCO would make data more accessible to scientists in less developed countries. He informed the Forum participants that DDE will launch a “DDE 2023 World Cup” competition for young scientists that would encourage young scientists to use the DDE Platform to answer specific earth sciences questions and problems. Guy Debonnet introduced geological sites included in the UNESCO World Heritage List. Such sites, due to their popularity arising from being part of a UNESCO List could provide opportunities for popularizing geological knowledge among visitors and people resident near them.?

In the closing session Prof. John Ludden, President of IUGS, summarized the principal outcomes of each of the 4 technical sessions. He expressed his satisfaction with the way the Forum had been organized and the quality of contributions from keynote speakers, panelists and participants. The Forum provided the much needed face-to-face interactions that are critical for DDE to establish links with current and potential future Members and partners. He expressed the hope that contacts and relationships developed during this DDE global launch will be continued after the Forum and will lead to interesting partnership initiatives among UNESCO, IUGS and DDE for the implementation of UNESCO Open Science Recommendation benefiting earth scientists in all parts of the world.

DDE Update meeting 7th Nov

The meeting was held at the Maison de la Géologie in Paris, with around 50 attendees, and around 15 in-person presenters and 5 virtual presenters. This was the first large-scale DDE meeting since the 2019 Fragrant Hills Beijing meeting that kicked off the DDE meeting. The event had three main themes with presentations within each theme. The themes were Deep-time, applied geology and standards and processes.

Deep-time

Mike Benton kicked off with a presentation from the Dinosaur Task Group describing how Sinosaurus jurassiccus had been scanned in 3D. This work, as well as providing striking images to engage the public, also provides serious scientific material for research for example into growth rates and dinosaur adaptations and evolution.

This was followed by a wide-ranging talk by Jim Ogg on paleogeography in DDE. He described people working not just on paleogeography but also palaeoceanography and palaeotopography. He described the uncertainty with DDE models and the need to discuss and develop models with regional specialists with complex geology and lithostratigraphy, for example India which has >1800 formations, and China which has > 2500 formations. Jim described the main problems for the Palaeogeography Working Group as manpower, expert reviewers, and the long term challenge of how to access data and expertise from companies such as Halliburton and IHS.

The Palaeontology Working group’s talk described the various palaeontological databases and the way that DDE’s work is distinguished, including ways that an automatic fossil classifier is being developed, as well as a techniques for fossil visualisation.

Daven Quinn from the Macrostrat initiative described the development of global scale maps from 7300 sources through the development of a Macrostrat age model. Parts of the system are available through a public API and mapping interface. Macrostrat is working with USGS.

In the discussion session following these talks, the importance of standards and interoperability was emphasized, as was the challenge of the compromise between data integrity and data availability – and instilling confidence in data so that academics will use it. Daven Quinn pointed out that the size of datasets readily exposes outliers of data. All participants said that funding was a problem and securing the right manpower. It was pointed out that some of the work – for example of correlation - was in many cases being done in other projects and long term endeavours for example in the constituent parts of the ICS.

Discussion session on Deep-time with Xu Honghe, Daven Quinn and Jim Ogg

Matt Harrison gave a talk from the perspective of an external expert in geoinformatics. Matt is a strategy director at BRGM. He described the main themes and challenges of BRGM including energy transition, resource scarcity, natural hazards, the built environment, open science and platforms, and FAIR. BRGM is commited also to artificial intelligence with around 40 projects in this area. Matt pointed out that the landscape of geoinformatics was complex and rich. Initiatives like OneGeology, EPOS, and the Geological Service of Europe are looking at some of the same issues as DDE. Matt pointed out that geoscience data is falling behind other science areas, for example genomics, in the area of FAIR – so some harder advocacy of geodata is needed to gain recognition and funding in Europe for the kinds of things that DDE wants to do.

Applied geoscience

The second session on applied geology began with the practical themes of marginal seas, carbon capture and storage, energy and geothermal. Jan Harff’s talk on marginal seas and their development during the last glacial (the Eemian) to the present time, covering the South China Sea, North Sea and Baltic Sea reconstructed coastal shelf morphology, future prospects to 2100 and discussed whether current coastal shelf protection programmes will work. Mike Stephenson discussed how palaeogeographical and facies data could be important at small and large scales for the deployment of CCS and how DDE should consider making a connection between its palaeogeographical work and developing geological properties maps that might allow assessment of?the small and large scale heterogeneities with basinal targets for CCS. A model being developed by Halliburton (see below, Gravestock et al. 2022) could also be used by DDE. Work like this could be used to ensure the DDE has a contribution to SDG7 (affordable and clean energy for all).

Model to develop CO2 storage screening tools from properties data derived from palaeogeographical data

Dave Leary discussed industrial involvement in DDE, and geothermal development. Data on bottom hole temperature are available and could be used in the basin wide modelling of geothermal potential in aquifers.

The session finished with talks from Patricio Villafane and Young Lee. Patricio stressed the importance of involving young geoscientists and early career researchers in DDE activities. Young lee outlined the projects of CCOP in south east Asia.

The panel session discussed how applied work could or should be brought into DDE, noting DDE’s academics origins. There was lively discussion on the relevance of deep time work: some participants believing that deep time research is vital to understand present problems; while others felt that its role was more limited. This discussion is important to the balance of academic and applied geoscience in DDE and will no doubt continue. Some concrete suggestions to increase applied work included closer relationships with stakeholders, and development of advisory boards for task or working groups within DDE to encourage consultation. There was a suggestion that CCS should perhaps be taken up as a Task Group in applied geology for DDE.

Standards and processes

The last session began with a talk by Francois Robida on the importance of standards in geoinformatics including in concepts, semantics and ontologies. He emphasized the importance of the collaborative and consultative nature of establishing standards. He said that development of standards should be an open process that ensures that there is no unnecessary duplication. He also pointed out that science evolves and therefore so should standards.

Harvey Thorleifson then described some of the activities of the DDE standards Task Group describing its work done in collaboration with CGI to develop a standards framework and training to ensure that DDE standards are taken up within the organisation a whole.

Guangsheng Yan described the China Node project. He said that Geological Surveys are likely to be the centre of geodata activities in many countries and the development of a node for a single country and GSO was a useful guide to how DDE might develop in other countries. The Geological Survey of China has 98 national geoscience databases and as a country node of DDE, it is developing platform, data, online tools and demonstrations.

The DDE Platform

A presentation on the long awaited DDE platform was provided by Wuanyuan Wang. The Deep-time.org website is a comprehensive manifestation of the DDE Platform. Users can directly search, visualize, analyze all the resources on the website, manage their own research with “MyDDE” and collaborate with others via “Project”. Meanwhile, based on Deep-time.org, the DDE Platform has also developed a series of working platforms and products for researchers to access.

A similar presentation by Zhong Hanting highlighted the virtual fieldwork DDE platform which will no doubt be inspiring and exciting for scientists and students wanting to learn about, and virtually visit, some of the key geological outcrops of the world.

Screenshot of the DDE virtual fieldwork platform

Manuel Pubellier followed with a talk on the Commission for the Geological Map of the World (CGMW) which is an association and a standardization body in the field of geology and stratigraphy. Its main role is the production of small-scale maps of continents, oceans, regions of the Earth. Manuel outlined some of the projects being done collaboratively between CGMW and DDE and discussed the challenges of going from 2D to 3D so that maps can provide even more subsurface information. The last talk of the session was from Hairong Lv and provided information on the DDE Data Working Group.

The final panel comprised scientists and specialists from both DDE and external organisations. It discussed three main themes.

The first was the contribution of deep time research to modern societal geoscience problems. There was lively discussion on the relevance of deep time work, some participants believing that deep time research is vital to understand present problems; while others felt that its role was more limited.

The final panel comprised scientists and specialists from both DDE and external organisations: Matt Harrison (BRGM) John Ludden (IUGS), Michiel van der Meulen (TNO), Jenny McKinley (Queen’s University Belfast), Manuel Pubellier (CGMW) and Pierre Toulhoat (ex BRGM)

Sources of data or links between existing databases. It was pointed out that sources of data or access to links between data are changing. Oil, gas and energy companies’ data may be less accessible than previously believed. This is because as the business models of energy companies change from oil and gas extraction to energy transition, their data have become a premium asset (for geothermal for example) so perhaps will be held back for commercial reasons and be less accessible than previously thought. One participant representing a major European geological survey stated that for most geological surveys with a national mandate and a statutory role, their focus is not particularly international. Despite this, it was believed by the group overall, that many scientific issues override national concerns and so there is an incentive to develop major international data initiatives like DDE. An example of this dilemma is critical metals where a global scientific aim is to understand their accessibility and distribution for the energy transition (for example for batteries), but where most countries reveal are a rather self-interested attitude to critical metals research where concerns of national security of supply score higher than the need for research into larger scientific questions. This will be a long running discussion in DDE in the years to come.

Overall, most participants thought that the virtual fieldwork DDE program was very attractive, particularly for geoscience education and outreach. This and the sophisticated DDE platform will no doubt be inspiring and exciting for young scientists. Several participants thought that DDE’s primary impact in the early years of its development may be in education and outreach, while the issues of data availability and national/international issues are being discussed and resolved in DDE and amongst other large data initiatives.

Minerals map for Africa: getting more out of African geodata

A proposal has been made to the World Bank by DDE to develop a minerals map for Africa.

Africa has enormous natural mineral resources for the energy transition, for example cobalt, tantalum and fluorspar, and is aiming at transforming resource wealth into sustainable economic development that benefits all Africans, while also conserving and enhancing the natural environment. As demand rises for critical raw materials, African nations are aiming at inward investment to develop local industry from mining to manufacturing to high value service industries, but also to get the best out of the resources that they choose to export. The flow of accessible geodata is key to local and inward foreign investment. The International Union of Geological Sciences founded in 1961, with 121 national members, is one of the World’s largest scientific organizations. Through its first big science program – Deep-time Digital Earth – it aims to work with African partners to develop better accessibility to key African geodata and develop artificial intelligence techniques to get more out of data.?

Background

The projected demand for critical raw materials is huge: an increase by a factor of four for graphite, five for cobalt, and eighteen for lithium by 2030; and by a factor of thirteen for graphite, fourteen for cobalt, and nearly sixty for lithium by 2050 . Africa has large resources of these and other materials for the energy transition. The opportunity for African nations to transform their natural resource wealth into economic development can be enhanced if there is an understanding of the size and distribution of these resources, and access to geodata and its interpretation for African and international investors.

Previous studies have shown that Africa’s economic development through the extractive industries sector is inhibited by the lack of, and difficulties of access to geodata. These problems act as disincentives to investment, planning and social interaction, and raise the cost barriers for both the public and private sectors intending to develop the EI sector.

DDE’s broad aim is to harmonise, connect and develop accessibility to data ‘islands’ to support broad-based scientific studies relevant to the entire Earth system , but also to develop geodata for economic development as part of the UN’s sustainable development goals (SDGs). DDE is researching interoperability, protocols, and platforms to deliver vast amounts of existing (and new) geodata, and researching ways to make geodata accessible to artificial intelligence.

About the project

DDE proposes a project to link and make accessible online geodata for critical raw materials for groups of African countries. The DDE standards program?will work to improve interoperability between data systems to allow seamless delivery across borders and to enable artificial intelligence techniques accessible to African scientists to get the best out of their geodata. The project will build on and interact with previous and current projects such as the African Mineral Geo-science Initiative (AMGI) and bilateral agreements such as the EU-Namibia raw materials partnership. The project will involve establishment of a DDE centre of excellence in Africa that will use DDE expertise in computing and be a centre for training and capacity building for African geoscientists.

The project is moving forward with meetings scheduled this year with the World Bank.

Enabling developing country decarbonisation in SDG7: democratisation and inclusion for geological data

A project has been proposed by DDE to UNESCO following a favourable discussion with Dr. Shamila Nair-Bedouelle, Assistant Director General (ADG) for the Natural Sciences at UNESCO. The project proposes developing basin screening tools for energy and decarbonisation in developing countries.

SDG7 aims at ensuring access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all. A challenge of SDG7 is decarbonisation in the Global South and a key part of this will be enabled through geological techniques such as carbon capture and storage, aquifer geothermal and hydrogen storage in geological sedimentary basins . Such basins are generally underexplored in the Global South leaving developing countries, their universities, students, institutions and governments unable to develop these key technologies, and being forced to rely on developed world expertise and investment. The Deep-time Digital Earth program of the International Union of Geological Sciences proposes the development of screening tools deriving from its sophisticated data and models that will be made available freely and inclusively to developing country universities, students, institutions and governments to build their geological capacity and plan for national strategies that work towards SDG7.

The project

Geological sedimentary basins are a key resource across the world. In the past they have been the source of hydrocarbons and minerals and other resources, but now are the focus of carbon abatement technologies such as carbon capture and storage, renewables-enabling storage technologies like hydrogen storage, and direct renewables such as aquifer geothermal. The potential for geological sedimentary basins to help in decarbonisation is very large. A recent study suggests that the North Sea basin could provide 30% of the decarbonisation needs of the UK. However many sedimentary basins are poorly explored across the world, particularly in developing countries where geological aspects of decarbonisation could have high potential. These basins need exploring at a broad scale to understand their potential and to guide strategic planning and investment.

Developing country geological capacity also needs to step up to ensure ownership and participation in technologies that are rapidly becoming dominated by the developed world. High quality data needs to be made available to developing country geoscientists, especially women geoscientists, and developing country institutions including geological surveys, universities and government regulatory and planning departments, so that they can strategically understand and develop their geological decarbonisation assets.

For decarbonisation such as carbon capture and storage we need to know about key properties of sedimentary basins such as porosity and permeability

Through its 25 working and task groups and data platform, DDE has developed ways to build models of geological sedimentary basins and aims to develop high level, low resolution models that illustrate key properties of sedimentary basins such as porosity, permeability, heatflow, evaporite distribution, and stratal patterns. These could be combined to create tools that would allow high level screening of basins for technologies such as carbon capture and storage that would indicate which parts of basins are suitable and illustrate potential for further investigation or to attract inward investment. All tools would be freely available to geoscientists using simple computing equipment significantly improving access to scientific data for all, and through further training, developing vital geoscience human capacity in developing countries aiming at SDG7.

The project is being pursued with UNESCO.

Viewpoint article

An article has been submitted to the new EAGE/Geological Society of London journal Geoenergy. In tandem with its sister journal, Petroleum Geoscience, Geoenergy focuses on the publication of timely and topical research in subsurface geoscience and the emerging energy transition field. Officially announced in June, at the 83rd EAGE Annual Conference & Exhibition, Geoenergy’s key topics are expected to include energy storage, geothermal energy, subsurface disposal and storage, hydrogen energy, critical minerals and sustainability.

The article is an opinion piece following an invitation to Mike Stephenson so contribute The article positions DDE and IUGS as independent non-aligned providers of science and data in the Critical raw materials field. Here is the abstract.

Critical raw materials (CRM) will be a cornerstone of the energy transition. CRM were recognised early by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) as a prime part of the mitigation effort for climate change, and as such research into the genesis of key metals, as well as the sustainability of their mining should be a priority. However, research is geopolitically influenced by the security of supply concerns of nations or economic groups of nations such as the EU, Japan, USA and China. Many research networks and programs are aimed at resource security; and where collaboration does exist it is along geopolitical lines, potentially disadvantaging developing countries and their efforts to implement UN sustainable development goals (SDGs). This contrasts with efforts in research such as those of the IPCC which are more collaborative and suited to rising to global challenges. We suggest that international organisations such as the International Union of Geological Sciences with its long international history, SDG focus, and new focus on data (through the Deep-time Digital Earth program) should be involved in research prioritisation unhindered by geopolitical considerations. Like climate change, the challenge of critical raw materials is too big to tackle in a competitive, geopolitically-influenced manner.

The authors are M H Stephenson, J Ludden, J McKinley, N Ishwaran, S Nash, D Leary, Y Shi and C Wang.

Blogs

Mike Stephenson contributed more blogs to the DDE website. There are now blogs on Making Geological Data Available; Decarbonisation and Geoscience Data; Carbon Capture and Storage: Palaeogeographical and Facies Data to Understand Suitability for Storage; DDE, Geoinformatics, and the Emerging Economies; and The Challenge and Opportunity of Big Data: A Comparison of Geoscience and Medical Science. See https://www.ddeworld.org/blog/156

DDE Twitter and LinkedIn sites

DDE now has Twitter and LinkedIn sites.?

Research Updates

DDE Platform Updates - provided by DDE Platform team

The DDE Platform aims to build a one-stop online collaborative environment for data-driven deep-time research. Thanks to the contribution of more than 100 international experts over a period of three years, the DDE platform has now reached a milestone.

The Deep-time Engine, as the core driver, links computing power from global cloud computing resources, data network based on central system, and knowledge network derived from diverse sourcing, into a unified research platform.

At present, DDE Platform has built a data network with over 35 million records covering 8 first level and 27 second level of geoscience disciplines, a knowledge system covering more than 30 major disciplines of solid earth science, and more than 80 geoscience analysis models. At the same time, the DDE Platform provides supporting software to meet the needs for accessing and using resources. Through these resources and software, scientists can complete precise intercontinental-scale mineral resource prediction, one-click global paleogeographic maps and other scenarios, and can also build their own application platform based on DDE Platform.

Pilot applications built based on DDE Platform

The terminal product, Deep-time.org alpha version, was officially launched on November 8, 2022. Prof. Jennifer McKinley, president of the DDE’s Governing Council, announced this exciting news in the presence of nearly 50 participants attending the meetings of the Governing Council (GC) and the Scientific Committee (SC) of the DDE at UNESCO Headquarters in Paris.

(Left) Deep-time.org 1.0 Alpha Version

(Right) Prof. Jennifer McKinley announced the global launch of the Deep-time.org

DDE Knowledge Update - provided by DDE Knowledge team

One of the core objectives of DDE is to build a multidisciplinary geoscience knowledge graph which supports the integration and sharing, mining and analysis of heterogeneous geoscience big data, and promotes geoscience knowledge discovery - and finally makes the transformation into a geoscience research paradigm driven by "data-model-knowledge". In order to push the construction of a geoscience knowledge graph, DDE has adopted two ways: manual collaborative construction and bottom-up machine intelligent mining, updating and completing. So far, DDE has developed a series of related software and tools, and formed three levels of basic, discipline and application geoscience knowledge graphs which cover about 20 geoscience disciplines.

In the aspect of software & tools, DDE has developed a top-down expert-based and bottom-up machine-based constructing system (the Editor and the ReCS, respectively) for establishing professional and sustainable geoscience knowledge graphs. Moreover, DDE established a one-stop system for opening and sharing geoscience knowledge graphs with global scientists. DDE has established various geoscience knowledge graphs, including basic geoscience ontologies, discipline knowledge graphs, and application geoscience knowledge graphs for sharing with global geoscience scientists. The core contributions in the past three years are introduced below.

1. SOFTWARE & TOOLS

(1) The Editor

The Editor (the Geoscience Knowledge Graph Collaborative Editor, https://editor.deep-time.org/KgEditorWeb/) is a “top-down” tool for creating, editing, verifying, and organizing ontologies and instances by professional scholars, experts and scientists. The Editor tool provides a cooperative editing function, a rigorous audit mechanism for constructing high-quality knowledge graphs (many ordered versions for tracing the evolution of knowledge), and a discussion community to collect a wider range of suggestions. Several Geoscience Professional Knowledge Graphs (GPKGs) have been constructed by scientists around the world using the Editor tool.

(2) The ReCS

The ReCS (Geoscience Knowledge Tree Auto-Renew and Completion System, https://recs.deep-time.org/ ) is a “bottom-up” tool for creating, supplementing, and expanding ontologies and instances from geoscience academic papers through machines and algorithms that run automatically. Using the ReCS system, DDE constructed geoscience academic knowledge graphs (GAKGs) by extracting numerous meta information from the discipline papers including titles, authors, affiliations, keywords, etc. and even structured contents, such as maps, tables, and figures. The automatically extracted knowledge can not only form a discipline knowledge system but also can be used to expand existing professional knowledge graphs.

(3) GeoOpenKG

GeoOpenKG (https://geoopenkg.deep-time.org) is a one-stop system for opening and sharing geoscience knowledge graphs with ordinary users, industrial applications, and scientific researchers in a simple and orderly way. It gathers multi-source knowledge graphs and the various open knowledge graphs commonly used in geoscience now, so that users can experience the one-stop process of acquiring geoscience knowledge and avoid the complex search and identify operations. It not only integrates the Editor system and the ReCS system but also provides the synergetic functions of knowledge retrieval, knowledge browsing, knowledge visualization and knowledge download.

2. KNOWLEDGE GRAPHS

(1) GPKG

Geoscience Professional Knowledge Graphs (GPKGs, https://editor.deep-time.org/KgEditorWeb/ ) are verified high-quality Geoscience knowledge graphs created by scientists around the world using the Editor. GPKG, currently, contains 61764 nodes and 64270 relations of 20 disciplines of Geoscience. These disciplines include: Stratigraphy, Paleontology, Geochronology, Sedimentology, Igneous petrology, Metamorphic petrology, Mineralogy, Paleogeography, Tectonics, Geomagnetism and Paleomagnetism, Geomorphology, Geophysics, Geological Mapping, Mathematical Geosciences, Surficial Geochemistry, Petroleum Geology, Hydrogeology, Geothermics, Engineering geology, and Metallogeny. At present, GPKG is still being improved, and scholars from all over the world are welcome to use the Editor and contribute their efforts to improve GPKG.

(2) GAKG

The Geoscience Academic Knowledge Graph (GAKG, https://gakg.acemap.info/#/ ) is a collection of literary elements, including papers, authors, affiliations, and other bibliometric data, and some multimodal information like illustrations, tables, and knowledge entities mentioned in geoscience papers. Currently, GAKG is the largest and most comprehensive geoscience academic knowledge graph, consisting of more than 120 million triples with 11 kinds of concepts connected by 19 relations, stored in RDF format. Based on the GAKG construction framework, the data and scale are updated in a timely fashion. Benefiting from the multimodality of GAKG, geoscientists can conduct research more visually.

(3) BO4KG

The Basic Ontology for Geoscience Knowledge Graph (BO4KG, https://geoopenkg.deep-time.org/kgs/1) provides basic, commonly-used, and interdisciplinary ontologies for all disciplines in Geoscience fields, to ensure basic concepts and attributes of different disciplines are consistent in semantics. Since consistent data spatio-temporal, morphology and provenance are particularly important for geo-data understanding, integration, sharing, as well as geo-computing and reasoning, BO4KG mainly proposed two unified frameworks for geoscience temporal and spatial expression and two basic data characteristic ontologies. Specifically, it consists of a series of time (different geological time scales), space (global toponyms and coordinate reference systems), data morphology (type, format, media, measurement, etc.), and data provenance (agent, data activities, tools, etc.) ontologies and KGs, which cover over 6 million RDF triples.

Upcoming events

15th International Petroleum Technology Conference

The International Petroleum Technology Conference (IPTC) is an influential event held semi-annually in either the Middle East or Asia. It is heavily attended by 3500 attendees from 50 countries, heavy on company leadership, both management and technical. This forum is highly influential in the industry. This will be the first time that DDE has had exposure to this group of Middle East and Asian idea / technology leaders. It will be an opportunity for DDE to display its achievements through a Carbon Capture and Utilization / Storage (CCUS) Workshop, where we intend to demonstrate the power of the Platform. Further we have DDE presence in both an ‘Ask the Expert’ session on Big Data as applied to CCUS, and by co-chairing two technical sessions. Further, there is a presentation that emphasizes the importance of creation of a global Well Log Registry for us by multiple WGs.

It will be an important milestone in exposing DDE to the Middle East, Asia and the Coordinating Committee for Geoscience Programmes in East and Southeast Asia (CCOP). We further plan on discussing improved interactions between DDE and the CCOP Technical Secretariat resident in Bangkok.

The Workshop occurs a day prior to the formal session, and the remainder of events run the course of the week. As with all DDE interactions, the most important part is to have active participants and enthusiastic high-level leaders, who are eager to share their ideas and goals and to work together to achieve a true international Deep-Time Digital Earth network.

Potential Outcomes include:

(1) High-level coordination of CCOP, DDE administration, Regional Geologic Surveys, and National and International Oil Companies on the directions of DDE during the next five years.

(2) Establishment of a CCOP Research Center of Excellence (RCE) with milestones, roles of each collaborating CCOP institution, etc. For this purpose, a joint White Paper – the preferred mode of communication – is anticipated.

(3) Coordination of DDE Energy Working Group and DDE platform team with other international centers on inter-linking databases, tools, etc.

Geo 2023 Bahrain, 7 - 9 March 2023

Prof Mike Stephenson will be presenting a course at the Middle east Oil Show (MEOS) on CCS from geoscience to public acceptance, finance and regulation, organised by AAPG.

This course is for geologists, environmental scientists, and geological regulators, policy makers and investors who are interested in carbon capture and storage. The course will cover: the role of CCS within decarbonisation as an aspect of earth system science; why CCS is necessary; how CO2 is captured in industrial processes and how it can be used industrially; the factors affecting geological storage; how CO2 stores are monitored for leakage; how CCS will be regulated; how CCS will pay for itself; and the social licence for CCS. The course will also highlight the developments in DDE to work on CCS

Reports from Working and Task Groups

The Working and Task groups are the backbone of scientific progress and achievements in DDE. Currently DDE has the following Working and Task groups:

Paleontology Working Group

The Paleontology Working Group (PWG) of the DDE was established with the foundation of GBDB (Geobiodiversity Database) and working group of paleontological and stratigraphical experts (Nanjing Institute of Geology and Palaeontology (NIGP) and other institutes), with the leaders Dr. Sylvie Crasquin and Prof. Wang Jun, and the secretary Dr Xu Honghe. The PWG aims to promoting data analysis and visualization for paleontology research, virtual examination, and geological survey.

During 2022, PWG designed and powered a multi-dimensional fossil specimen database for the DDE, OneFossil (https://onefossil.deep-time.org/), with integration of the GBDB, PBDB, and fossil-Ontology, and the newly collected integrated data of fossil specimens (from China and furthermore globally), including paleontological taxa, geological ages and horizons, geographical localities, specimen repositories, and high-dimensional data (images and 3-D models). The database of OneFossil is open worldwide, for experts and laymen, promoting data-driven research.

PWG integrated and collected global fossil data of Mesozoic insects, Paleozoic microfossils, and some regional plants. The metadata standard on fossil specimens is proposed and utilized in the OneFossil database (Xu et al., 2022). With these multi-dimensional paleontological data, an invention patent on automatic classifying graptolite images was achieved (Pan et al., 2022), and the software is released on both PC and mobile devices as ‘AiFossil’. Additionally, server scientific data-driven results were achieved as below. The progress of the PWG was presented by Prof Wang Jun in the UNESCO Open Science meeting in Paris in Nov 6-9, 2022.

Insects were the first terrestrial animals to use air-borne sound signals for long-distance communication. Among acoustically signalling insects, katydids stand out as an ideal source to investigate the evolution of acoustic organs and behavior. Xu et al. (2022) carried out a detailed and global investigation of fossil katydids from the Mesozoic Era (commonly referred to as the age of the dinosaurs), according to exceptionally preserved katydid tympanal ear fossils from the Middle Jurassic Daohugou Konservat-Lagerst?tten. With the aid of a global dataset of insect fossils of the GBDB, their study also reconstructs singing frequencies and acoustic communication of Mesozoic katydids.

Wang et al. (2022) recognized A new phytogeographical zone of Guizhou from the Early Devonian flora of South China, based on their zosterophyll fertile structure fossils and a regional plant fossil dataset. They also suggested that the Guizhou sub-region might act as a bridge, aiding plant dispersal from eastern Yunnan to Cathaysia during the Early Devonian.

Liang et al. (2022) recognized the spatio-temporal pattern of the Ordovician chitinozoan Lagenochitina, based on its global occurrence dataset and re-assessed its evolutionary and stratigraphical significances.?

Frequency range of hearing in vertebrates (above) and frequency range of tones used by extant crickets and fossil katydids (below).

Lower Devonian flora regions on the South China palaeogeographical map. The red dashed line with arrows and numbers indicates the probable plant dispersal routes and sequence.

References

Liang Y, N?lvak J, Xu H, Chen Y, Hints O. 2022. Revision of Ordovician chitinozoan Lagenochitina esthonica sensu lato: morphometrics, biostratigraphy and paleobiogeography. Journal of Paleontology 96, 46-60. doi: 10.1017/jpa.2021.79.

Pan Y. Xu HH, Niu Z. 2022. Patent for Invention: a hierarchical constraint-based method and system for classifying fine-grained graptolite images. Patent no.: ZL2022 1 0159814.4. China National Intellectual Property Administration. February 22, 2022.

Wang Y., Bai J., Liu B-C., Wang Y., Xu H.-H. 2022. New insights into the South China Lower Devonian flora based on fossils from Hezhang, Guizhou Province. Philosophical Transactions of Royal Society, B377, no. 1847, 20210312. doi: 10.1098/rstb.2021.0312.

Xu C, Wang B, Wappler T et al. 2022. High acoustic diversity and behavioral complexity of katydids in the Mesozoic soundscape. PNAS, 119 (51). e2210601119. doi: 10.1073/pnas.2210601119.

Xu HH, Nie T, Guo W, Chen Y, Yuan W. 2022. Metadata standard on palaeontological specimens. Acta Palaeontologica Sinica. 61. 280-290. DOI: 10.19800/j.cnki.aps.2022007.

Marginal Seas Task Group

This report gives an overview of the achievements of the DDE Marginal Seas Task Group for the year 2022. The following internal reports to the DDE Secretariat provide further information:

1.??????Harff, J., 2022a. DEEP TIME DIGITAL EARTH PROGRAM (DDE); Annual Report of DDE Marginal Seas Task Group Duration: 2021-2022, internal report, Institute of Marine and Environmental Sciences, University of Szczecin / DDE, 7 p., 3 Fig.

2.??????Harff, J., 2022b. Marginal Seas Task Group, Report Jan to June 2022. internal report, Institute of Marine and Environmental Sciences, University of Szczecin / DDE, 7 p., 3 Fig.

3.??????Harff, J. 2023a. Draft table of contents and responsibilities for writing of the DDE Annual Report 2022 (Marginal Seas contribution).- internal report, Institute of Marine and Environmental Sciences, University of Szczecin / DDE, 12 p., 7 Fig.

4.??????Harff, J. 2023b. DDE Annual Report 2022 Task Group_Marginal Seas.- internal report, Institute of Marine and Environmental Sciences, University of Szczecin / DDE, 21p., 9 Fig., 5 Tab., 1 enclosure

5.??????Harff, J. 2023c. Mid-term Report 2021-2023 of DDE MargSeas TG.- internal report, Institute of Marine and Environmental Sciences, University of Szczecin / DDE, 15 p., 7 Fig.

6.??????Miluch, J., 2022a. Marginal Seas Database Inventory: concept, first approach and future steps. internal report, Institute of Marine and Environmental Sciences, University of Szczecin / DDE, 27 p., 7 Fig., 3 Tabl.

7.??????Miluch, J., 2022b. DDE Marginal Seas Task Group website – concept-. internal report, Institute of Marine and Environmental Sciences, University of Szczecin / DDE, 7 p., 1 Tabl.

8.??????Zhang, W., 2022. DDE Research & Development Projects Annual Report for Project Year Ending_11.2021-10.2022_Project Name: Morphological evolution of coastal seas – Past and Future. Internal report, Helmholtz Zentrum HEREON, DDE, 9 p., 2 Tabl.

Conferences and meetings

The group was also involved in the?DDE Open Science Forum (hybrid online/face-to-face), Co-sponsored by UNESCO, IUGS and DDE on 9 November 2022, Salle II, UNESCO Headquarters, and the DDE, IUGS, CGMW sponsored DDE Update Meeting (7 November) also in Paris.

The group helped to organize?the 4th Baltic Earth Conference, Topical Session “Comparing marginal seas”, (4th Marginal Seas Expert Meeting), 30. May 2022 - 03. June 2022 (hybrid face-to-face / online) and the international online Conference “River Mouth Systems and Marginal Seas - Natural drivers and human impacts” (5th Marginal Seas Expert Meeting), 05 - 07 December 2022, co-organized by DDE Marginal Seas Task Group, and the University of Szczecin, National Museum in Szczecin, International Baltic Earth Secretariat at Helmholtz Zentrum (https://baltic.earth/rivermouthsystems2022).

Projects

The activities of the DDE MargSeas Task Group are closely related to the DDE R&D Project “Morphological Evolution of Coastal Seas – Past and Future” initiated by the MargSeas TG and co-ordinated by the PI, Dr. Wenyan Zhang, Helmholtz Zentrum Hereon, Geesthacht, Germany, co-leader of the MargSeas TG. A progress report for the year 2022 was submitted to DDE secretariat by Dr. Wenyan Zhang on 29th September 2022.

The project has successfully achieved its milestones for 2022. Reconstruction of coastal morphology for the North Sea and Baltic Sea for the LGC was finalized. Results are being summarized in a manuscript which will be reported to DDE secretariat before submission to a scientific journal for publication. Data will be uploaded to the DDE Marginal Seas website and Helmholtz Data Center with open access to public as soon as the manuscript is submitted. Reconstruction of coastal morphology for the northern and western South China Sea was still in progress and will be finalized in 2023. Work on future projection initiated in January 2023.??????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????????

In addition the group is working on a Marginal Seas Data Bases Inventory (MSDI). This is directly connected with the MS Project is the development of an inventory of data bases to be used for the application of morphodynamic models for coastal areas of the marginal seas to be compared: Baltic Sea, North Sea, South China Sea.

Through the Marginal Seas Data Base Inventory (MSDI) the Marginal Seas Task Group provided a basic study for Objective 1 of the 5-Years Medium-Term Plan (MTP) of DDE. As final results the author submitted a report (Miluch 2022) describing a prototype of data base inventory MSDI generated for a first implementation for the MS-Project. The figure shows schematically the general concept of MSDI for the search of data bases to be used for coastal morphodynamic models.?

Graphical scheme of the Marginal Seas Database Inventory (Miluch 2022a)?

Summary

In summary the establishment of the DDE Marginal Seas Task Group marks a step forward to understand comprehensively the functioning of marginal seas as buffer zones between continents and oceans helping to mitigate the threats of coastal environmental disasters and to promote planning for sustainable marine and coastal development.

The main results of the work phase 2022 are:

(1)?????????The successful application for funding and the co-ordination of the project “Morphological Evolution of Coastal Seas – Past and Future” provides the sources for three years advanced marginal seas research.

(2)?????????The development of the concept of Marginal Seas Database Inventory (MSDI) serves as a convenient tool supporting geoscientists by simplifying the search for data. The concept allows users of mathematical model applications in marine sciences to generate specific data sets for the parametrization of the models referred to the solution of a current scientific task.

(3)?????????The Marginal Seas online conferences served as base line studies for the current and future research program of the Marginal Seas Task Group and helped to establish the international Marginal Seas scientific network. In particular, the 5th MargSeas Expert meeting extended the international network of the MargSeas TG remarkably by including scientists from India and South Africa.

(4)????????? The Szczecin Marginal Seas Webinars organized monthly during the academic year are an effective tool of the Marginal Seas TS’s educational, training and capacity building activities.

(5)?????????A highlight for the Marginal Seas Task Group was presentation of research and management results at the DDE Open Science Forum and the ?DDE Update Meeting, Paris, France.

The main objectives for 2023 are:

(1)?????????Foster internal co-operation and scientific exchange with DDE WTGs and external co-operation with natural scientists, socio-economists, modelers and IT specialists for harmonization and standardization and data sharing of marginal seas geo-data and AI /numerical model design. Main geo-scientific interest should be directed to understand the interrelation between the anthroposphere and marginal seas geosphere, ecosphere and climate.

(2)?????????The organization of the Marginal Seas Session at the IAMG2023 annual conference at Trondheim, Norway, August 2023 will be organized as the highlight of the annual activities of the MargSeas TG in 2023.

(3)?????????Develop co-operation with International science programs and societal stakeholders to generate cause-effect scenarios with the goal of optimizing environmental management strategies for sustainable development of marginal seas and their coastal zones.

(4)?????????Focus for the development of internal and external communication will be the development of an attractive DDE Marginal Seas website.

(5)?????????Expand the team's creativity by involving young scientists in particular by developing cooperation with the DDE Young Earth Scientists Task Group and International Association for Mathematical Geosciences (IAMG). In 2023 the Marginal Seas Session at the 37th International Geological Congress will be prepared.

Data Science Working Group

The DDE Data Science Working Group hosted a Mineral Informatics Datathon at the Earth and Planets Laboratory, Carnegie Institution for Science, Washington, DC from December 19 to 21, 2022, to accelerate cyberinfrastructure construction and data-intensive research in mineralogy.?

Normally, a datathon is iterative and efficient process within a small team. This was the first Mineral Informatics datathon after the pandemic and the organizers (Drs. Xiaogang Ma, Anirudh Prabhu, and Shaunna Morrison) received enthusiastic requests from their networks. Eventually, the datathon had 22 participants with career stages ranging from university professor to high school student. The organizers set up four focused themes: 1) Open Mineral Data, 2) Co-relationship Analysis in Mineralogy, 3) Visualization of Dana Classification, and 4) Mineral Association Analysis Cyberinfrastructure. Several participants also brought their own datasets, such as meteorite minerals and new mineral species discovered in Russia.?

On the first day morning, all the proposed scientific topics, data resources, initial results, and potential breakthroughs were presented and discussed. Then a few breakout groups were set up to work on them, with balanced expertise’s of data management, data analysis coding, report and presentation writing in each group. At the end of each day all groups joined again for about half an hour to report the progress and the members in other groups were able to ask questions and give comments. A few participants who were interested in multiple topics split their time and worked in each group for a while. The meeting organizers acted as facilitator to observe the progress of all groups and offer suggestions, and they also helped with the logistics, such as the order of lunch and dinner. A few participants also brought snacks they prepared at home. In the afternoon of the last day, all groups wrapped up their work and came back to give a long presentation. They also drafted plans for scientific publications and collaboration in future work.

The Mineral Informatics Datathon offered a lot of opportunities for data managers, software developers and data analysts to interact with geoscientists, to ensure that the developed data platforms such as Mindat, RRUFF and EarthChem meet geoscientists’ needs. The results of data analysis were also impressive. Altogether, six journal papers were planned at the end of the datathon. The next round of datathon, according to the initial plan of the organizers, will take place in May of 2023. The progress and initial outputs for this datathon were communicated with several other DDE members and working group leaders and they showed interests to send students or postdocs for future datathon activities.

Dinosaur Task Group

Throughout 2022, the team at IVPP (Beijing, China) has been building a detailed new dinosaur database, which is composed of a more complete dinosaur skeleton database and a dinosaur track database. Up to now, 1204 fossil records with four levels of tables: reference, type specimens (2886 in total, up to 2020), attributes, and bone elements, have been collected in the dinosaur skeleton database, with descriptions of their type specimens (accounting for 42% of all type specimens), including 3D scanning and digital installation of three theropods: Yutyrannus, Sinosaurus, and Allosaurus. Sixteen specimens have been scanned using surface scanners to create detailed 3D models of all bones; nine specimens have been digitally reconstructed. The dinosaur tracks database contains 3859 theropod tracks with 384 articles in total, of which 3662 tracks are of tridactyl theropods and 197 tracks are of didactyl theropods. More information is being collected; a shortage of professional members and funding still remains to complete these tasks.

?In 2022, we proposed to build a three-part scientific research and popularization initiative with the support of DDE, which includes a Digital Dinosaur Museum, a Dinosaur Research Center and a Popularization Center named “Cretaceous Kingdom”. The digital dinosaur museum, different from other conventional dinosaur museums, will be the first that does not focus on physical exhibits but is mainly supported by digital technologies, such as 3D projection, virtual reality, and other metaverse technologies. It will display the history of dinosaurs and the change of biodiversity through the reconstruction of paleoecology and the excavation through modern field work, emphasizing the experience brought by changing living environments, connecting the future with the past. Facing the public and the market, the Cretaceous Kingdom will integrate functions of popularization and entertainment, aiming to raise public awareness of co-existence and co-evolution with the planet through stories, drama, experiments, etc. It is a long-term program, of which the frameworks have been fully discussed while details have yet to be completed and polished.

In addition, the Dinosaur Research Center will engage with improvements and training of dinosaur researchers and students, who can enhance their ability and be supported by DDE and the Digital Dinosaur Alliance in their study, establishing a foundation of international digital dinosaur research.

Southeast Asia Task Group

Together with Korea Institute of Geoscience and Mineral Resources (KIGAM), the Coordinating Committee for Geoscience Programmes in East and Southeast Asia (CCOP), the leader organization of the DDE Southeast Asia Task Group, has been working towards accessibility of digital geological sample data in CCOP Member Countries.?To this end, the GDR Web System has been launched under the official domain, https://ccop-gdr.org/ in a cloud server.?This can also be accessed through the CCOP website, https://ccop.asia/

CCOP GDR Web System is an integrated geoscience data repository system to manage digital research data and physical samples, for sharing nationally and internationally.?This system can be used to collect, manage, and share data produced from 100 years ago and in the future.?This system can be customized for the internal use of each CCOP Member Country organization according to the organization’s respective requirements under the CCOP-KIGAM GDR technology transfer program.?For more information on the GDR system, you can email CCOP at [email protected] or Dr. Saro Lee, [email protected].

Young Earth Scientists Task Group

The Young Earth Scientists (YES) Task Group is one of the newest groups in Deep-time Digital Earth (DDE). This group was created in October 2022 in collaboration with the Young Earth Scientists (YES) Network, an international association of young and early career Earth scientists who are primarily under the age of 35 or are within ten years after graduating from their PhD, and are from universities, geosciences organizations and companies from across the world.

The mission of the YES Task Group will focus on two main goals: 1- The develop and use the YES Network as a platform to raise the profile and participation of young Earth and data scientists from around the world in DDE activities. 2- Collaborate with DDE on global programs related to climate change, energy and mineral resources, geohazard, geoconservation and UNESCO Global Geoparks, open science, among others.

Despite its early age, this group has participated in the Deep-time Digital Earth (DDE) Open Science Forum (9 November 2022, Paris), and is currently organizing the DDE World Cup, which will be presented at the next EGU General Assembly 2023.

Contribute to the Newsletter

The DDE Newsletter is published quarterly. If you have research to publicise, information about conferences attended or papers published in the DDE sphere, send your contributions to. Opinions and reactions to the information provided in this edition, as well as any questions you may have on specific issues are also welcome