Earth Science

IceBridge, a six-year NASA mission, is the largest airborne survey of Earth's polar ice ever flown. It will yield an unprecedented three-dimensional view of Arctic and Antarctic ice sheets, ice shelves and sea ice. These flights will provide a yearly, multi-instrument look at the behavior of the rapidly changing features of the Greenland and Antarctic ice.

Data collected during IceBridge will help scientists bridge the gap in polar observations between NASA's Ice, Cloud and Land Elevation Satellite (ICESat) -- in orbit since 2003 -- and ICESat-2, planned for 2018. ICESat stopped collecting science data in 2009, making IceBridge critical for ensuring a continuous series of observations.

IceBridge will use airborne instruments to map Arctic and Antarctic areas once a year. IceBridge flights are conducted in March-May over Greenland and in October-November over Antarctica. Other smaller airborne surveys around the world are also part of the IceBridge campaign.

EarthByte is an internationally leading eGeoscience collaboration between several Australian Universities, international centres of excellence and industry partners. One of the fundamental aims of the EarthByte Group is geodata synthesis through space and time, assimilating the wealth of disparate geological and geophysical data into a four-dimensional Earth model including tectonics, geodynamics and surface processes. The EarthByte Group is pursuing open innovation via collaborative software development, high performance and distributed computing, “big data” analysis and by making open access digital data collections available to the community.

GENESIS (Global Environmental & Earth Science Information System) is a suite of data services that bring together the Earth science products generated by spaceborne Global Positioning System (GPS) receivers flying on several international missions. GENESIS provides a database for GPS occultation observations from the CHAMP and SAC-C spacecraft, which carry NASA-supplied GPS receivers designed for atmospheric and ionospheric sounding. The flight database is augmented with GPS ground data and a variety of higher level derived products. We hope soon that occultation data from the GRACE mission can be added to this unique archive.

Remote sensing of the Earth and other Planetary surfaces is a rapidly growing science that cuts across a wide range of disciplines, including volcanic, tectonic, biologic, oceanographic and environmental studies of the Earth’s surface, as well as the search for past and present life on other planetary surfaces. It involves multispectral, hyperspectral and thermal imaging, RADAR and LiDAR imaging, and the engineering development of new remote sensing tools. The close interaction between scientists and engineers at UCSC distinguishes this program from many others and leads to exciting interdisciplinary ventures not possible without such interactions.

GeoNet is the official source of geological (earthquake and volcano) hazard information for New Zealand.

EarthCube is a quickly growing community of scientists across all geoscience domains, as well as geoinformatics researchers and data scientists. EarthCube is a joint effort between the NSF Directorate for Geosciences and the Division of Advanced Cyberinfrastructure.

EarthCube was initiated by the National Science Foundation (NSF) in 2011 to transform geoscience research by developing cyberinfrastructure to improve access, sharing, visualization, and analysis of all forms of geosciences data and related resources. As a community-governed effort, EarthCube's goal is to enable geoscientists to tackle the challenges of understanding and predicting a complex and evolving solid Earth, hydrosphere, atmosphere, and space environment systems. The NSF's Directorate for Geosciences (GEO) and the Division of Advanced Cyberinfrastructure (ACI) partnered to sponsor EarthCube, which NSF anticipates supporting through 2022.

The Deep Carbon Observatory is a global research program to transform our understanding of carbon in Earth. At its heart, DCO is a community of scientists, from biologists to physicists, geoscientists to chemists, and many others whose work crosses these disciplinary lines, forging a new, integrative field of deep carbon science. To complement this groundbreaking research, the DCO’s infrastructure includes public engagement and education, online and offline community support, innovative data management, and novel instrumentation.

Geoscientists from American and Canadian universities are installing a series of seismometers in Minnesota, Wisconsin, and Ontario in the context of SPREE (Superior Province Rifting EarthScope Experiment).These seismometers will record earthquakes that occur locally,regionally, and throughout the world. Scientists use the seismic waves from these earthquakes to produce high-resolution images of the Earth’s interior.

The Geological Institute at ETH Zurich performs leading research and teaching activities over a wide range of geological disciplines. Detailed information on research activities, teaching, people can be found in the corresponding sections: biogeoscience, climate geology, engineering geology, earth surface dynamics, structural geology and tectonics.

<img src="http://www.elementlist.com/images/alaskaeqlogo.jpg" alt="alaska earthquake observatory" width="126" height="104" align="right">Located at the Geophysical Institute of the University of Alaska Fairbanks, the Alaska Earthquake Information Center receives data from more than 350 seismic sites. AEIC serves as an integration of all seismic networks within Alaska, also archiving and processing data from the Pacific Coast and Alaska Tsunami Warning Center in Palmer, Alaska, (~20 sites), and the Alaska Volcano Observatory in Fairbanks and Anchorage (~90 sites). All sites in the network operate with a real-time data acquisition system at the Geophysical Institute. The network is further strengthened by three Incorporated Research Institutions for Seismology (IRIS) sites, at College, Kodiak Island, and Adak. The Alaska Earthquake Information Center, a member of the Council of the National Seismic System (CNSS), is funded by the State of Alaska, NOAA, and USGS. Alaska Earthquake Information Center personnel locate and report about 22,000 earthquakes each year, and advise federal and state officials of each major earthquake's location and size within 30 minutes. In addition, the earthquake catalogs generated by AEIC are fundamental for seismic hazard studies, because they are the most important element in defining the seismic source zones and the level of seismicity. Alaskan earthquakes, active faults, and rupture zones. Interactive Alaska seismicity maps.

The Scripps Institution of Oceanography Visualization Center at the Cecil H. and Ida M. Green Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics is a state-of-the-art visualization facility for presenting and manipulating very large datasets. In addition to housing a Highly Immersive Visualization Environment [HIVE] we are involved in the development and application of the Geowall visualization system, the Optiputer project, and geoscience research.

The High-Resolution Seismic Network (HRSN) is one of several networks of seismic instrumentation in northern and central California operated by the Berkeley Seismological Laboratory. The HRSN is an array of borehole instrumentation deployed in the Parkfield area, with the goal of monitoring microseismicity on the San Andreas fault.

WAPMERR was created in 2001 in Geneva, Switzerland, as a non-profit organization for the purposes of reducing risk due to disasters and for rescue planning after disasters. These goals are achieved by advancing methods of real-time loss estimates after earthquakes, by estimating the extent of future disasters in scenario mode, by calculating tsunami risks, by characterizing the nature of the building stock in cities at risk, and through monitoring by satellite images, as well as by earthquake prediction research. In these efforts, we are collaborating with scientists in several western European countries, Russia, the USA, Japan, Asia and South America. The foci of these efforts are countries that are developing and may not have their own capability to assess the earthquake risk and extent of disasters accurately and rapidly.

The Harvard University Center for the Environment (HUCE) encourages research and education about the environment and its many interactions with human society. The Center draws its strength from faculty members and students across the University who make up a remarkable intellectual community of scholars, researchers, and teachers of diverse fields including chemistry, earth and planetary sciences, engineering and applied sciences, biology, public health and medicine, government, business, economics, religion, and the law. The most pressing problems facing our natural environment are complex, often requiring collaborative investigation by scholars versed in different disciplines. By connecting scholars and practitioners from different disciplines, the Center for the Environment seeks to raise the quality of environmental research at Harvard and beyond.

The Pacific Northwest Center for Geologic Mapping Studies (GeoMapNW) is a grant-funded collaborative research center hosted by the Earth and Space Sciences Department at the University of Washington. The mission of the Center is to provide geologic data and expertise, to conduct geologic mapping and research, and to support the geologic research efforts of others throughout the Pacific NW and beyond.

As a world leader in Environmental Sciences CIRES is committed to identifying and pursuing innovative research in Earth System Science and to fostering public awareness of these processes to ensure a sustainable future environment. CIRES is dedicated to fundamental and interdisciplinary research targeted at all aspects of Earth System Science and is communicating these findings to the global scientific community, to decision-makers, and to the public.

The Princeton Environmental Institute (PEI) coordinates environmental education, research and outreach activities at Princeton University. Its more than 65 associated faculty members in the natural sciences, engineering, social sciences and humanities share a common interest in advancing environmental research and teaching and promoting environmental programs on campus and in the surrounding community. PEI

The interests of the faculty cover a broad range of earth sciences. The traditional fields of petrology, mineralogy, mineral resources and structural geology are represented. Solid earth geophysics includes a unique combination of expertise in seismology, mineral physics and geodynamics. Recently we have added a marine geophysics program, an atmospheric science program and most recently a planetary science program, with links to programs in the Departments of Chemistry, Astronomy, Geography and Environmental Science and Policy Management.

Knowledge of the composition, structure and evolution of the Earth's crust and of processes which continue to modify it, is becoming increasingly important for the wise management of the Earth's resources and environment, consistent with the principles of sustainable development. In the light of the societal importance of these issues, and the capability of scientific drilling to make a quantum leap in the scientific understanding, the International Continental Scientific Drilling Program (ICDP) is an essential component of responsible management strategies for the resources and environment of the dynamic Earth.

The Woods Hole Research Center conducts research, identifies policies, and supports educational activities that advance the well-being of humans and of the environment. Our mission is to understand the causes and consequences of environmental change as a basis for policy solutions for a better world. We specialize in ecological research on land use in the normally forested regions, including the Amazon Basin, Eurasia, the Congo Basin, and North America. We seek to conserve and sustain forests, soils, water, and energy by demonstrating their value to human health and economic prosperity. We work locally and regionally, assisting communities with resource management, and internationally to promote policies that stabilize climate and protect the integrity of the global environment.