NASA/TM–2004–212753

GLOBAL CHANGE DATA CENTER

Mission, Organization, Major Activities, and 2003 Highlights

June 2004

National Aeronautics and 

Space Administration

Goddard Space Flight Center

Greenbelt, Maryland 20771
The cover image shows Hurricane Isabel as it approached the Mid-Atlantic States in September 

2003; the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite overflew the storm an unusually 

large number of times in the storm’s life cycle. The TRMM Precipitation Radar (PR) observed 

Hurricane Isabel six times, which is more times than the PR has seen with any other individual 

hurricane. What was especially significant was that the PR swath was effectively centered on the 

eye of the storm in each instance. In the future, this unique set of observations may help scientists 

understand how the heavy rain in a hurricane’s eyewall evolves during the hurricane’s lifetime. The 

composite image also shows the wider field of view of the TRMM Microwave Imager (TMI). The 

TMI collects passive microwave data that are similar to, but at a higher resolution than, the data 

of existing Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I) instruments. Even after Hurricane Isabel 

struck the U.S. East Coast and forced the evacuation of NASA Goddard, the TRMM Science Data 

and Information System (TSDIS) continued to provide near-real time monitoring of the heavy rain 

associated with Hurricane Isabel.
NASA/TM–2004–212753

National Aeronautics and 

Space Administration

Goddard Space Flight Center

Greenbelt, Maryland 20771

June 2004

Global Change Data Center

Mission, Organization, Major Activities, and 2003 Highlights 
Available from:

NASA Center for AeroSpace Information National Technical Information Service

7121 Standard Drive 5285 Port Royal Road

Hanover, MD 21076-1320 Springfield, VA 22161

Price Code: A17 Price Code: A10
TABLE OF CONTENTS

1. INTRODUCTION...................................................................................................................................1

2. PHILOSOPHY........................................................................................................................................3

3. ORGANIZATION AND FACILITIES...................................................................................................5

 

4. OUR WORK AND ITS PLACE IN NASA’S MISSION........................................................................7

 

5. MAJOR ACTIVITIES AND HIGHLIGHTS IN 2001 ...........................................................................9

5.1 Earth Science Data System Working Groups...........................................................................9

 5.1.1 Organization ..............................................................................................................9

 5.1.2 Major Activities.........................................................................................................9

5.2 Global Change Master Directory ........................................................................................... 10

 5.2.1 Mission.................................................................................................................... 10

 5.2.2 Science User Working Group ................................................................................. 10

 5.2.3 Organization ........................................................................................................... 10

 5.2.4 Highlights................................................................................................................ 10

 5.2.5 Facility for Operations and Maintenance................................................................ 11

 5.2.6 System Development............................................................................................... 13

 5.2.7 Metrics for Content, Usage, and User Feedback and Support................................. 14

 5.2.8 Collaborations.........................................................................................................25

 5.2.9 Standards.................................................................................................................30

5.3 Goddard Earth Sciences Data and Information Systems Center/DAAC................................ 33

 5.3.1 Organization, Mission, and Strategy....................................................................... 33

 5.3.2 Data Set Holdings ................................................................................................... 35

 5.3.3 Data Systems and Tool Holdings ............................................................................ 39

 5.3.4 Major Activities and Highlights.............................................................................. 39

5.4 GMAO Computer System Group ...........................................................................................49

 5.4.1 System Development and Maintenance ..................................................................49

 5.4.2 GEOS System Operations.......................................................................................50

5.5 SeaWiFS Data System............................................................................................................50

5.6 TRMM Science Data and Information System...................................................................... 51

 5.6.1 Organization............................................................................................................ 51

 5.6.2 Facility .................................................................................................................... 51

 5.6.3 Major Activities....................................................................................................... 51

 5.6.4 Highlights................................................................................................................ 55

6. EDUCATION AND PUBLIC OUTREACH ........................................................................................ 57

APPENDIX 1. PRESENTATIONS AND PUBLICATIONS................................................................... 59

APPENDIX 2. ACRONYMS ..................................................................................................................63

TABLE OF CONTENTS

 2003 ANNUAL REPORT iii 

 2003 ANNUAL REPORT 1

INTRODUCTION HELLO KITTY

1. INTRODUCTION

Rapid, efficient access to Earth sciences data from satellites and ground validation stations is fundamental 

to the nation’s efforts to understand the effects of global environmental changes and their implications for 

public policy. It becomes a bigger challenge in the future when data volumes increase from current levels 

to terabytes per day. Demands on data storage, data access, network throughput, processing power, and database and information management are increased by orders of magnitude, while budgets remain constant 

and even shrink.

The Global Change Data Center’s (GCDC) mission is to develop and operate data systems, generate science 

products, and provide archival and distribution services for Earth science data in support of the U.S. Global 

Change Program and NASA’s Earth Sciences Enterprise. The ultimate product of the GCDC activities is 

access to data to support research, education, and public policy.

 2003 ANNUAL REPORT 3

HPELLO HILOSOPHY KITT

2. PHILOSOPHY

The GCDC is an office in the Earth Sciences Directorate of the Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC). The 

GCDC encompasses the design, development, and management of data and information systems; the development of processing algorithms, the production of data products, the management of Earth science data 

archives; and the management of information system projects.

To carry out its mission and to meet the organizational objectives, GCDC has adopted a management strategy 

that builds on four major strategic parameters: quality, productivity, efficiency, and partnerships. Within this 

context, GCDC has adopted the following core management concepts.

Customer Driven Quality: The ultimate success of the GCDC organization depends on its ability to deliver quality products and services to a diverse user community on time and with minimum cost. All GCDC projects 

stress a customer focus based on an analysis of the total information system from a customer’s perspective. 

This analysis starts with the establishment of performance-oriented requirements and ends only after delivery 

of a product (system, services, algorithm, data products, etc.) that satisfies the customer.

Leadership: Strong, resourceful leaders establish the direction and focus of the individual GCDC project 

teams. A GCDC leader is expected to be a coach, a trainer, a team builder, and a role model for the project 

teams. Each leader must constantly assess what to change, what to change to, and how to change so that their 

project achieves the quality, productivity, and efficiency measures needed for success.

Continuous Process Improvement: Most of the projects managed by GCDC are in a competitive environment 

where the customer has a choice and increasingly high expectations for services. Moreover, staff and budget 

constraints are a way of life and are unlikely to change in the foreseeable future. For these reasons, the continuous review and improvement of critical processes is vital to the efficient and effective delivery of quality 

products that meet the customer’s needs.

Employee Participation and Development: Organizational success depends on the effective use of all the individual skills, abilities, and expertise of the limited government and contractor staff. GCDC projects are 

conducted in a cross-functional team environment that emphasizes individual accountability and creativity, encourages participation in the decision making process, and provides rewards based on the successful 

achievement of project objectives. GCDC stresses the importance of employee development through training, 

experience, career enrichment, and recognition.

Distributed Management: The GCDC uses the strength of its leaders and employees by providing a great deal 

of autonomy to each project. The responsibility and accountability for decisions is delegated to the lowest 

level possible. The GCDC provides an overall management framework for integrated strategic planning, budgeting, scheduling, resource allocation, and project assessment. Project leaders are responsible for achieving 

individual project goals within this overall framework.

Organizational Responsiveness: Responsiveness to ever changing and evolving customer requirements requires 

that information systems and services be flexible and adaptable and that new systems be developed rapidly. 

Product cycle time is an important factor in meeting customer expectation and achieving project objectives 

with minimum cost. GCDC uses a variety of techniques to facilitate short development cycles including 

rapid application development and prototyping.

Design Quality: The often conflicting demands of delivering the right products with high quality, on time, and 

with shrinking budgets, emphasizes the need to build it right the first time. This is accomplished by using a 
 4 2003 ANNUAL REPORT

HPELLO HILOSOPHY KITT

team that encompass all the processes inherent in delivering an information system (design, development, 

test, deployment, maintenance, and operations) throughout the entire development.

Strategic Outlook: In order to effectively plan and manage its organizational resources, the GCDC must 

maintain a strategic perspective that anticipates evolving needs, and provides an orderly process for meeting those needs. This perspective is needed to provide a road map for the organization and a framework for 

decisions involving new business.

Objective Management: To ensure that management decisions are based on facts and are timely and appropriate, projects require a flow of accurate, objective information. Open communications, objective metrics, 

and well understood plans and schedules are critical to this process. It is important that, whenever possible, 

decisions be made rationally, and not in response to the crises.

Partnership Development: Partnerships with our customers are fundamental to success. The clear establishment 

of mutually understood requirements, the ability to meet those requirements, and the flexibility to respond 

to changing requirements and development problems cannot be done without close working relationships 

between all parties. This is particularly important in the current environment where expectations grow and 

budgets shrink.

Business Rules: The GCDC attempts to adhere to the following rules in conducting its day-to-day business:

• Anchor strategic planning to customer needs and organizational goals

• Anticipate and be responsive to customer needs

• Develop cost-effective systems and solutions

• Use open and extensible system architecture

• Provide value-added systems, services, and skills

• Reward leadership, innovation, creativity, and personal responsibility

• Minimize and simplify interfaces

• Emphasize flexibility, modularity, and reusability in system design

• Maximize electronic access to information and services
 2003 ANNUAL REPORT 5

ORGANIZATION ANDHPELLO FHILOSOPHY ACILITIES KITTY

3. ORGANIZATION AND FACILITIES

The GCDC is organized by projects. The ongoing projects include the Global Modeling and Assimilation 

Office (GMAO) Computer System Group (CSG), Global Change Master Directory (GCMD), Goddard Earth 

Sciences Data Information Systems Center, Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-view Sensor (SeaWiFS) Data System, 

and the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) Science Data and Information System (TSDIS). The 

Global Precipitation Mission data system is in a study phase, mainly conducted within the TSDIS Project. 

There are 25 civil servants within GCDC. The composition of the GCDC Division Office and each project 

are as follows.

Global Change Data Center

Stephen Wharton Chief, GCDC

Richard Kiang Group Leader

Michelle Renaud (Code 903)

Gary Wolford

Earth Science Data System Working Groups

Catherine Corlan

Kathleen Fontaine

Global Change Master Directory

Lola Olsen Manager

Janine Pollack

Goddard Earth Science Data and Information Systems (ESDIS) Center

Steven Kempler (Code 586) Manager

Gary Alcott (Code 581)

Stephen Berrick

Eunice Eng (Code 586)

Gregory Leptoukh

Christopher Lynnes

Long Pham

Peter Smith

Darnell Tabb

Bruce Vollmer

Gail Wade

Goddard Modeling and Assimilation Office Computer System

Gi-Kong Kim Manager

SeaWiFS Data System

Gene Feldman Manager, also SeaWiFS Project Manager

Norman Kuring

TRMM Science Data and Information System

Erich Stocker Manager

Michael McCumber Deputy Manager

Charles Cosner, Jr. 
 6 2003 ANNUAL REPORT

HPOELLO HILOSOPHY RGANIZATION KITTY AND FACILITIES

Aside from civil servants, the GCDC work activities are supported by a staff from George Mason University’s 

Center for Earth Observing and Space Research and a number of supporting contractors. The majority of the 

GCDC personnel are located in Building 32. SeaWiFS Data System personnel are located in Building 28.
 2003 ANNUAL REPORT 7

OUR WORK AND ITS PLACE IN NASA' HPELLO HILOSOPHY S MISSION KITTY

4. OUR WORK AND ITS PLACE IN NASA’S MISSION

The Global Change Data Center provides an essential interface to the scientific community and to the public 

through its data service, publications, presentations, Web pages, collaborations, and conferences. The data, 

data products, and associated services provided by the GCDC’s various data systems directly support NASA’s 

mission: to understand and protect our home planet; to explore the universe and search for life; to inspire 

the next generation of explorers, ...as only NASA can. We help understand and protect our home planet by 

providing the data and data services necessary to understanding the Earth’s system and its response to natural 

and human-induced changes. Our computing technologies and collaborations listed later in this document 

help our users improve the quality of life and create a more secure world. In addition, we are helping to 

inspire the next generation of explorers by providing educational material to help motivate students, inspire 

teachers, and improve our Nation’s scientific literacy. 

The mission of the Earth Science Enterprise (ESE) takes a three-pronged approach. With a science strategy, 

an applications strategy, and a technology strategy, the ESE seeks to develop a scientific understanding of 

the Earth system and its response to natural and human-induced changes to enable improved prediction of 

climate, weather, and natural hazards for present and future generations. This approach provides data and 

information necessary to answer a fundamental question: How is the Earth changing and what are the consequences for life on Earth? The many examples that follow illustrate the GCDC’s commitment to do data 

collection, processing, dissemination, and modeling as only NASA can.

 2003 ANNUAL REPORT 9

MAJOR ACTIVITIES AND HIGHLIGHTS PELLO HILOSOPHY IN 2003 KITTY

5. MAJOR ACTIVITIES AND HIGHLIGHTS IN 2002

5.1 Earth Science Data System Working Groups

5.1.1 ORGANIZATION

The Earth Science Data System Working Groups (ES DSWG) stemmed from recommendations outlined in 

the Strategic Evolution of Earth Science Enterprise Data Systems (SEEDS) Study. The SEEDS Study examined the vital issues surrounding distributed, heterogeneous data systems, as outlined in the concept paper, 

“NewDISS:A 6- to 10-year Approach to Data Systems and Services for NASA’s Earth Science Enterprise.” 

To perform the study, the team identified seven major areas of interest: near-term standards, long-term 

standards process, data life-cycle issues, reuse and reference architectures, metrics planning and reporting, 

levels of service and cost modeling, and technology infusion. For each area, a study team was formed to 

identify the state of the Enterprise efforts in those areas, identify the future needs of the Enterprise, determine the community needs, and recommend a way forward. Over the course of roughly two years, the team 

held three public workshops; many, many smaller meetings and teleconferences; and countless one-on-one 

discussions with members of other Federal agencies, commercial organizations, universities, data providers, and other users of the ESE data systems. The result, the final recommendations, is available at http:

//lennier.gsfc.nasa.gov/seeds/SFormHome.html. 

The working groups established as a result of the SEEDS study are now known collectively as the ES DSWG. 

The first set of working groups are Metrics Planning and Reporting, Technology Infusion, Reuse and Reuse 

Frameworks, and Standards. These four groups held a kick-off meeting in January 2004 in Orlando, Florida. 

Web sites have been established for all groups, and are located at http://lennier.gsfc.nasa.gov/seeds/WG/. 

5.1.2 MAJOR ACTIVITIES

Each working group is currently completing its initial set of activities. These include finalizing their charters, establishing rules of operation, and identifying items of high priority to the Enterprise. When fully 

established, each group will prioritize its work, and then make a series of recommendations to the ESE 

regarding their area of expertise. Initially, each working group is composed of the winners of a recent ESE 

data system solicitation, as well as other interested parties. It is expected that as the working groups become 

more established, interest and membership will expand.

Current activities include the following four key areas:

1. Metrics Planning and Reporting

• Finalizing a set of metrics for use by the ESE

• Finalizing a tool for reporting those metrics by smaller data providers

• Identifying or combining current metrics collection tools for use by larger data providers

2. Technology Infusion

• Finalizing the process by which data system technology gaps are identified

• Finalizing the technology drivers in use by the ESE which feed into the above process

3. Reuse and Reuse Frameworks

• Finalizing their charter

• Finalizing the process for identifying reuse candidates and evaluating their potential 

• Identifying such policy issues as intellectual property rights and studying their effect on reuse 
 10 2003 ANNUAL REPORT

HPMELLO HILOSOPHY AJORKITTY ACTIVITIES AND HIGHLIGHTS IN 2003

4. Standards

• Finalizing their initial set of Request for Comments (RFCs) which outline how the identification and 

adoption of ESE standards will work

For more information on any of the above groups or the SEEDS study, please contact Kathy Fontaine at 

kathy.fontaine@nasa.gov or 301-614-5582.

5.2 Global Change Master Directory

5.2.1 MISSION

The mission of the GCMD is to assist the scientific community in the discovery of, and linkage to, Earth 

science data and related services, as well as to provide data holders a means of advertising their data to the 

Earth science community. The GCMD leads the search to data, offers links to data providers, and often 

leads directly to the data itself.

5.2.2 SCIENCE USER WORKING GROUP

Representing the broad range of Earth science disciplines including life sciences, oceanography, geophysics, and atmospheric science is an active Science User Working Group (UWG). Members are chosen for 

their interest in NASA’s directory effort, and for their understanding of the importance of high quality data 

management. The composition of the group for the upcoming UWG meeting in May 2004 includes Acting 

Chairperson, Mr. Martin Ruzek of the University Space Research Association (USRA); Dr. Walter R. Hoegy, NASA/Goddard representative from Code 910; Dr. Erick Chiang, National Science Foundation/Office 

of Polar Programs; Dr. Glenn Rutledge, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA)/National 

Climatic Data Center (NCDC); Dr. Benno Blumenthal, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory at Columbia 

University; Dr. Wendell Brown, University of Massachusetts-Dartmouth; Dr. Hubert Staudigel, Scripps 

Institution of Oceanography; Ms. Andrea Buffam from the Canadian Centre for Remote Sensing (CCRS), 

representing the Committee on Earth Observation Satellites’ International Directory Network (CEOS IDN); 

and Dr. Doug Beard, United Staes Geological Service (USGS)/Biological Resources Division (BRD). The 

GCMD Science User Working Group works under the UWG Terms of Reference. Recommendations from 

previous UWG meetings have helped to guide the progress of the directory.

5.2.3 ORGANIZATION

The directory is staffed by three software developers, a systems administrator, a database administrator, and 

four Earth science coordinators (one coordinator is supported by the USGS BRD), the contract task lead, 

and the project manager, Lola Olsen. The science coordinators are responsible for the data sets related to the 

biosphere and land surface; oceans and the hydrosphere; solid Earth and the cryosphere; solar-terrestrial interactions; spectral/engineering data; agriculture and human dimensions; the atmosphere and climate indicators; 

and paleoclimate. The software developers collectively hold skills in database management, programming 

languages such as Python, Java, Perl, and C++, user interface design, and configuration management.

5.2.4 HIGHLIGHTS

Following are the top five highlights for 2003 that have had the greatest positive impact on the GCMD 

work:
 2003 ANNUAL REPORT 11

MAJOR ACTIVITIES AND HIGHLIGHTS PELLO HILOSOPHY IN 2003 KITTY

1. Improved configuration management, with expanded testing through a set-up of “sand-box” machines. 

Extensive test plans to complete functional end-to-end testing of all major system components on a 

variety of platforms were designed for quality assurance. 

2. There has been recognition of the value of the “portals” by an increasing number of interested groups. 

Virtual subsets of the directory can be created for special events and/or for groups wishing to host a 

directory of only their contributions. During 2003, 11 new portals were created. 

3. The addition of an “Update” option within the authoring tools, permits updates to be made quickly and 

easily by external participants. This important advancement provides an important key to maintaining 

current information in the directory.

4. There has been a 47.7% rise in content for Earth science tools and services. This created increased 

interest in fruitful searches and the impetus to add new content.

5. The addition of a new topic keyword category, “Climate Indicators,” is now the most frequently searched 

of the 13 topics. 

5.2.5 FACILITY FOR OPERATIONS AND MAINTENANCE

The GCMD facility is located at GSFC. The primary operational computing resources consist of a “proxy” 

computer and a backup for the proxy-accessible as http://globalchange.nasa.gov. These computers route users 

to one of two operational computers, so that one is always available for user access when the other needs 

maintenance or requires the installation of upgrades. To ease the network burden for off-site contractors, a 

“development platform” is available at the contractor’s facility. New this year are a series of testing platforms 

(several acquired through Goddard’s equipment “excess”) to perform cross-platform testing, and quality 

assurance (see the following diagrams).
 12 2003 ANNUAL REPORT

HPMELLO HILOSOPHY AJORKITTY ACTIVITIES AND HIGHLIGHTS IN 2003

GCMD Production Servers

Location: GSFC Building 32, Room C101 Row N

Internet Proxy

GCMD

gcmd.nasa.gov

OS: Redhat

HELIUM

Production

Machine

http://gcmd.nasa.gov

http://globalchange.nasa.gov

GCMD Primary

Web Server

RSYNC Destination for webtree

on gcmd.sesda.com

Oxygen

oxygen.gsfc.nasa.gov

E-mail Server

DIFmacs

Arkeia Backups

Backup Server

RSYNC Backups

Overland Tape Backup

Arkeia

Mapserver

mapserver.gsfc.nasa.gov

Mapserver System

ESRI/Genaware

Linux

OS: Redhat Adv.Server 2.1

NFS Mount

FTP Server

ftp://gcmdftp.gsfc.nasa.gov

OS: OpenBSO

OS: Linux

OS: Redhat ? (Linux) OS: Solaris

GCMD4/IDN.CEOS.ORG

GCMD

Fallover

Webserver

GCMD Mirror

RSYNC Destination

for webtree on

gcmd.sesda.com

IDN Machine

Zope 2.5.1

http://idn.ceos.org/IDN/

Main CVS

Repository

GCMD Development Server

Location: Aerospace Building 5th floor, Room 564

Development Machine (the "Blade")

GCMD. SESDA / GCMDDEV.SESDA

URL: http://gcmd.sesda.com

MD 8

Apache 1 Server

/usr/server/httpd/

Webtree Source

/data3/webtree_v1/md8html

MDS Ops Download

New Web Site

http://gcmd.sesda.com:1881/

OS: Solaris

URL: http://gcmddev.sesda.com

MD 9

Apache 2 Server

/usr/server/httpddev/html

Bugzilla

http://gcmddev.sesda.com/bugzilla/

Thesaurus

http://gcmddev.sesda.com/thesaurus/assistant.html

ESRI Map Server

(Temporarily Disabled)

Zope for GCMD Staff (Future)
 2003 ANNUAL REPORT 13

MAJOR ACTIVITIES AND HIGHLIGHTS PELLO HILOSOPHY IN 2003 KITTY

Development/Testing Sandboxes

Location: GSFC Building 32, Room C101 Row J

Sandbox - L

OS: Linux

Sandbox - 0

OS: OS-X

Sandbox - 1

(Down)

OS: Irix

Sandbox - S

New Web Site Testing

http://sandbox-s.gsfc.nasa.gov:1881

Hydrogen

RAID - 5

Linux Testbed

Current

SuSE 8.2.9.0

Fedora Core 1

Redhat ES 3.0

OS: Solaris Oracle 9.2

5.2.6 SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT

To make electronic and information technology accessible to people with disabilities, Congress amended the 

Rehabilitation Act. The law is known as “508,” and the GCMD’s MD8 software is fully “508” compliant. 

Software upgrades were integrated (transparently to the users) during the year-as the code was reconfigured 

“behind the scenes” into a better-organized, more reusable package in preparation for the ISO-19115 implementation. Users may note visible upgrades: 

• A new capability to refine the current query to include global, global land, and global ocean data 

sets;

• An upgraded parent–child functionality which allows users to refine by children only, parents only, 

and navigate more easily between the two; and 

• More direct access to data such as from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) 

through links located next to the titles’ display. 

For the first time last year, the Operations Facility (OPS) was made available to all the science coordinators 

to interact directly with the database. The facility performed well in 2003. Changes were also made within 

the Local Database Agent (LDA) software for improved functionality of the distributed aspect of the system 

(see the revised diagram).

In addition, the Geospatial One-Stop was completed, permitting users to access information easily by project. 

This search for NASA projects (missions) was based on the development of a free-text search through the 

open-source search engine, Lucene (see http://gcmd.gsfc.nasa.gov/md/lucene/luceneSearch.html).

The work was done in response to OMB A-11 Guidance regarding posting information on geospatial data acquisitions and on 

compliance with Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) standards. A-11, Section 51 Basic Justification Materials: In 

February 2003, agencies must post information on all geospatial data acquisitions in excess of $1M planned for FY 2004 on 

the FGDC Clearinghouse, characterized using the FGDC metadata standard, taking care to specify the geographic area and 

scale to which the data layer is proposed to be collected. Exhibit 300 Section II.A.2 Data C. If this initiative processes spatial 

data, identify planned investments for spatial data and demonstrate how the agency ensures compliance with FGDC standards 

required by OMB Circular A-16. See the Web site, http://www.geo-one-stop.gov/.
 14 2003 ANNUAL REPORT

HPMELLO HILOSOPHY AJORKITTY ACTIVITIES AND HIGHLIGHTS IN 2003

DB

NETWORK

LDA

Server

Metadata

Observer

Local

DB

Local Database Agent

Trigger

Table

Incoming Queue

Table

Updater

New Content

MD Server

ND Server

Local Database Agent

DB ND Server

Local Database Agent

DB ND Server

Local Database Agent

Mirrors

Table

Local Database Agent

UNEP JCADM JAXA

GCMD

5.2.7 METRICS FOR CONTENT, USAGE, AND USER FEEDBACK AND SUPPORT

5.2.7.1 Content

The population of the directory’s data sets reached 14,049 at the end of December 2003, which is up from 

12,343 the previous year. The number of new data set descriptions decreased from 2,503 in CY02, to 2293 in 

CY03; however, the number of revised data set descriptions increased 4.9% from 6,376 in CY02, to 6,691 in 

CY03. The distribution of Directory Interchange Formats (DIFs) among Earth science topics can be viewed 

in the chart below (where SERF is defined as the Services Entry Resource File):

GCMD Population 2002 2003 Change in 

2003 Input [%]

New DIFs 2503 2293 –8.3

Revised DIFs 6375 6691 4.9

New SERFs 243 359 47.7

Revised SERFs 213 276 29.6

New Data Centers 42 333 692.8

Revised Data Centers 27 21 –22.2

New Sources 52 144 176.9

Revised Sources 12 69 475.0

New Sensors 5 519 10,280.0

Revised Sensors 23 56 143.5

New Projects 401 84 –79.0

Revised Projects 37 32 –13.5
 2003 ANNUAL REPORT 15

MAJOR ACTIVITIES AND HIGHLIGHTS PELLO HILOSOPHY IN 2003 KITTY

Population of DIFs by Earth Science Topic:

Topic 2002 2003 Change [%]

Agriculture 168 139 –17.3

Atmosphere 565 617 9.2

Biosphere 696 798 14.6

Climate Indicators N/A 21 N/A

Cryosphere 336 218 –35.1

Human Dimensions 629 398 –36.7

Hydrosphere 245 332 35.5

Land Surface 722 553 –23.45

Oceans 415 702 69.1

Paleoclimate 48 93 93.7

Radiance/Imagery 255 160 –37.2

Sun–Earth 

Interactions 6 13 116.7

Solid Earth 340 322 –5.3
 16 2003 ANNUAL REPORT

HPMELLO HILOSOPHY AJORKITTY ACTIVITIES AND HIGHLIGHTS IN 2003

Population of SERFs by Earth Science Service Topic:

Topic 2002 2003 Change [%]

 Data Analysis and Visualization 199 374 87.94

 Data Handling 114 206 80.70

 Education/Outreach 139 199 43.17

 Environmental Advisory 46 78 69.57

 Hazards Management 11 28 154.55

 Information and Reference Services 51 96 88.24

 Metadata Handling 7 25 257.14

 Models 51 126 147.06
 2003 ANNUAL REPORT 17

MAJOR ACTIVITIES AND HIGHLIGHTS PELLO HILOSOPHY IN 2003 KITTY

The GCMD continues to offer a variety of metadata authoring tools for the creation and modification 

of DIFs and SERFs. The DIF writing tools are widely used among the Earth Observing System Data and 

Information System (EOSDIS) Distributed Active Archive Centers (DAACs). Langley Research Center/

Atmospheric Sciences Data Center (LaRC/ASDC), the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), Goddard 

Earth Sciences (GES), Marshall Space Flight Center/Global Hydrology Resource Center (MSFC/GHRC), 

the Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center (SEDAC), and Physical Oceanography DAAC (PODAAC) 

regularly send all their new and modified DIFs using the DIF authoring and modification tools. The DAACs 

have also contributed new and revised SERFs using the online tools. In total, the DAACs contributed 431 

DIFs and 17 SERFs to the GCMD in 2003. Development of new, Extended Markup Language (XML)-based 

and Java-based metadata authoring tools (docBUILDER) is well underway, with the release scheduled for 

early 2004.

Several of the Federation’s Earth Science Information Partners (ESIPs) have provided DIFs and SERFs using 

the metadata authoring tools. The University of New Hampshire (EOS-WEBSTER), Distributed Oceanographic Data System/Open-Source Project for a Network Data Access Protocol (DODS/OPeNDAP), and 

the Museums Teaching Planet Earth (MuTPE) were the most active contributors during the year. In total, the 

non-DAAC Type 1, Type 2, and 3 ESIPs contributed 254 new DIFs and 25 new SERFs.

1. A critical aspect of the GCMD mission is that of providing links to data sets. At the end of CY03, the 

GCMD provided 70,535 links to data sets and information within the DIF and SERF metadata - up 

from 52,539 in CY02, and an additional 4,327 links from within supplemental descriptions (instruments, platforms, projects, data centers) and 1,430 links to web resources on the Earth Science pointers 

page. 

2. The Global Change Conference Calendar now contains 1007 conference listings. During 2003, 202 

new conferences were added and 17 were revised. 

5.2.7.2 GCMD Web Usage

Usage, as measured by the number of unique hosts, for CY03 was down by 11.7% from 202,518 to 178,730 

unique hosts-reflecting the inability of the metrics software to determine unique users among the collapsed 

“.com” addresses. The number of “hits” on the GCMD Web site continued to climb from 6,463,527 in CY02, 

to 7,569,397 in CY03 (+17.1%). User Web sessions show a remarkable “academic year”-like pattern of low 

activity during the summer and winter holidays.

U.S. Unique Hosts 2002 2003 Change 

[%]

.gov 4,774 3,925 –17.8

.edu 13,637 10,469 –23.2

.org 1,625 1,332 –18.1

.com 37,921 32,613 –14.0

.net 41,793 39,135 –6.4

.mil 1,207 831 –31.1

.us 2,566 1,849 –27.9

Numerical 55,263 46,351 –16.1

Hits (GCMD Site) 6,463,527 7,569,397 17.1
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International Hosts 2002 2003 Change [%]

All International hosts 43,732 42,225 –3.4

.it (Italy) 2,450 2,841 15.9

.jp (Japan) 2,508 2,451 –2.3

.fr (France) 2,306 2,405 4.3

.de (Germany) 2,845 2,618 –8.0

.uk (United Kingdom) 3,431 3,499 2.0

.ar (Argentina) 808 612 –24.0

.ca (Canada) 5,446 4,063 –25.4

.br (Brazil) 735 1,304 77.4

.nz (New Zealand) 653 469 –28.2

.ru (Russia) 598 512 –14.4

.au (Australia) 3,634 2,795 –23.1

Other International 18,318 18,656 1.8

All Unique HOSTS 202,518 178,730 –11.7
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Search and retrieval from free-text interfaces:

Interface 2002 2003 Change 

[%]

Search: Free-Text 51,559 57,730 11.9

Retrieval: Free-Text 26,138 25,912 –0.9

Search: ZServer 50,261 204,216 306.3

Retrieval: ZServer 115,755 133,540 15.3

Retrieval: Supplemental 528,961 195,709 –63.0

Search and retrieval from keyword interfaces:

Keyword 2002 2003 Change 

[%]

Search: Keyword 124,427 80,839 –35.0

Retrieval: Keyword 66,644 257,211 285.9

Search: Portal Keywords 33,150 12,123 –63.4

Retrieval: Portal Keywords 27,994 24,772 –11.5

 * Global Land Information System is no longer available.

Total Retrievals 2002 2003 Change 

[%]

Retrievals: All Sources 540,471 690,685 27.8
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Parameter Searches Searches 

Conducted

Total 

Searches 

[%]

Agriculture 6,203 7.7

Atmosphere 9,565 11.8

Biosphere 5,029 6.2

Climate Indicators 3,031 3.7

Cryosphere 3,695 4.6

Human Dimensions 5,244 6.5

Hydrosphere 4,118 5.1

Land Surface 7,731 9.1

Oceans 7,244 9.0

Paleoclimate 3,503 4.3

Radiance/Imagery 3,281 4.1

Sun-Earth Interactions 26 0.03

Solid Earth 4,987 6.2

Locations 3,290 4.1

Platforms 2,558 3.2

Instruments 3,064 3.8

Projects 2,612 3.2

Data Centers 6,018 7.4
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5.2.7.3 User Feedback and User Support

There were 101 user support questions received during 2003. Users typically ask questions about locating 

maps and images, climate data, and sources of information on various science topics. Below are some examples of user support questions received: 

“I am writing a term paper about the Northwest Passage. I want to write about three major points: 

1. The climate change, the melting of the ice, the lengthening of the melting periods; 2. The 

legal status of the route, legal character; and 3. This route as a navigable route. My question 

to you: can you help me in finding information or could you provide me information?” 

“I am looking for an aerial or satellite photograph of my father-in-law’s land in British Columbia, Canada.” 

“Could you please tell me the national map projection parameters for Bolivia?” 

“I have EndNote6 (ISI) a software which allows downloading of records for reference purposes 

(scientific papers) if the service is Z39.50 compliant. I imagine that your server is. I do need 

information to set up a connection file for downloading. Can you help me?” 

“I’m looking for raw data on global temperatures over the last say 200 years and CO2 readings 

so that pupils can graph the results and draw conclusions.” 

“My teacher asked that before the next class I find the location of our school in degrees, minutes, 

and seconds, but I really don’t know how to get it. Please help me.” 

“How can I obtain recent global land clearing statistics?” 

“I am looking for data on the Marianas Trench. Has it been changing in any way?” 

“I’d like to know about atmospheric conditions (ex. Great Northern Lights) and be alerted as 

to when they are.” 
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“Hi. My name is ___. I’m a senior and I’m working on a science project. My topic is the North 

Atlantic Oscillation and how it affects the weather in Europe. One of my friends has been 

talking to you and you sent her some very helpful data sets and I was hoping maybe you could 

do the same for me! If not its OK, but anything you think you could do to help me would be 

greatly appreciated!! Thank you so much!”

Some of the types of user feedback is evident in the following:

Liam O’Reilly (Student) in search of rainforest destruction information for a report. “Thank 

you very much for the helpful information. I will write back to you and tell you what I get 

on it.”

Professor Don Hyndman was in search of a weather map and jet stream information. He wrote, 

“Thanks for the Web links. The NOAA one is the best. Although I had browsed various 

NOAA sites I had not seen this one. It has some good images and explanations. One of them 

is actually a nice, concise explanation of the Jet Streams: http://www.srh.weather.gov/jetstream/

global/jet.htm.”

Mariana Castillo in search of national map projection parameters for Bolivia. “It’s amazing, 

thanks a lot!”

Arindam Ghosh in search of climate data links for the Indian stations and the Indian Ocean. 

“Thanks a lot for the information. These links are really very useful. Thanks again!”

Charles T. Robinson had many questions pertaining to the GCMD parameter keywords. “Thanks 

for the quick response, this is exactly what I needed.”

Carol Kreis (a freelance writer) developing an educational map for Newsweek about human 

impacts on climate change. She wanted to know how to obtain permission to reproduce the 

graph, “The increase of atmospheric CO2 over time.” After receiving assistance, she wrote, 

“Thanks for your prompt reply”.

Liesbeth Van Iseghem (a student) needed assistance on researching the Northwest Passage. She 

replied “It has been a while but you sent me information and you supported me in writing my 

term paper about the Northwest Passage. I want to thank you very much for your help. It was 

not an easy subject but it was so interesting. I learned so much and really felt a discoverer. At 

school there were people who supported me and were interested. There were, unfortunately, 

also ‘non-believers’, who thought it was a stupid subject. But I made it, yesterday I graduated 

with distinction!! I will always, from now on, follow a little bit the evolution in the Arctic 

sea-ice and all related subjects! Thank you so much for your help and support, without you 

I could never succeed in doing this.”

Antje Dun (Australian Conservation Foundation Representative) requested assistance with land 

clearing statistics for 2002 and 2003. After receiving assistance, the user responded, “Thank 

you so much for your help. You are wonderful! I look forward to hearing from you if you 

find any more information about 2003.”

Mathew Koelz was in search of an algorithm for distance between a pair of latitude and longitude coordinates. The user responded, “Much appreciated... and thanks for taking the time 

to look... my calculator uses the cosine method, with a small addition for the radius for the 
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average height amsl [Above Mean Sea Level], but my problem was the distance for the minute of arc. With the information in the document, I hope to improve my calculator accuracy 

somewhat, which is only used for distances of 10000’ or less.”

Helen Pan was in search of satellite and space photographs of China. She responded, “Thanks 

a million. It is powerful. I can’t get these pictures in China.”

Hailie Cook was in search of global warming information. The user replied, “Thank you so 

much for the websites you sent.” 

Mallory Guerin was in search of ultraviolet-B radiation and rainforest information. The user 

responded, “Thank you so much Gene for taking time out to help me. I think that I will be 

able to use this information in my paper.” 

Danna Smith was in search of North Atlantic Oscillation data and responded, “Wow!!! Thank 

you so much!! This is a huge help! You have no idea how much I appreciate this!! Once again 

thank you sooooo much!!”

5.2.8 COLLABORATIONS

5.2.8.1 Portals 

Many organizations acknowledge the importance of metadata related to their area of interest, but do not 

have the resources required to manage their content. Portals allow organizations to maintain and document 

their data without duplicating the effort in creating another online directory. By hosting metadata through 

a GCMD portal, users can view the virtual subset of interest. Portals help provide science, or applicationspecific foci for other agencies, science focus groups, consortia, etc., and may be trademarked with the logo 

of an organization. 

Using a portal to search a virtual subset is advantageous in that as metadata is added to the subset, it is also 

freely available from the GCMD’s general search pages for scientists in other disciplines to access and use. 

Maintenance and creation of customized free-text and keyword search portals for the science community 

continued in 2003 with 11 new portals added. Usage statistics are also regularly tracked and available (see 

http://gcmd.nasa.gov/Data/portal_index.html).

Maintenance and creation of customized free-text and keyword search portals for the science community 

continued in 2003. Additional portals for the Antarctic Master Directory, the Japan Aerospace eXploration 

Agency (JAXA), and other organizations will be added during 2004 (see http://gcmd.nasa.gov/Data/portal_

index.html).
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Current portals include:

• U.S. Department of Agriculture, created October 1999

• Global Observation System Information Center (GOSIC) including the Global Climate Observing System 

(GCOS)

• Global Terrestrial Observing System, and Global Ocean Observing Systems (GTOS and GOOS, respectively), created March 2000

• Joint Committee on Antarctic Data Management/Antarctic Master Directory (JCADM/AMD), created 

August 2000

• DODS, created August 2000

• Global Observation of Forest Cover (GOFC), a CEOS project, created September 2000

• ESIP, created December 2000

• Global Ocean Ecosystems Dynamics (GLOBEC), an International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme 

(IGBP) project, created May 2001

• CEOS, created June 2001

• World Data Centers (WDC), created June 2001

• Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science (RSMAS) [University of Miami], created July 

2001

• Climate Variability and Predictability (CLIVAR), a World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) project, 

created January 2002

• Geographic Information for Sustainable Development (GISD), a CEOS project, created June 2002

• Model Output Data portal, created September 2002

• NOAA, created July 2002

Created in 2003:

• Argentina Antarctic Center, created August 2003

• Belgian Antarctic Program, created January 2003

• Canadian Polar Commission/Canadian Committee for Antarctic Research, created October 2003
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• Finnish Antarctic Program, created January 2003

• Swiss Committee on Polar Research, created November 2003

• NASA Geospatial Framework, created September 2003

• NASA GSFC GES Distributed Active Archive Center, created June 2003

• National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), created September 2003

• Remote Sensing for Conservation, created May 2003

• United Nations (UN) Earth Science Data, created April 2003

• World Water Forum (WWF), created January 2003

5.2.8.2 Collaboration Updates for 2003

DODS/OPeNDAP:

DODS/OPeNDAP currently promotes the GCMD through the portal on their Web site and through presentations at scientific conferences. The GCMD continues to serve as a locator for all of the DODS data sets. 

Statistics for this portal are presented to DODS each month. As of December 31, 2003, an average of 304 

visitors accessed the portal each month. The GCMD has also worked closely with DODS to provide direct 

access to the Live Access Server (LAS) data sets and to provide a direct link through GCMD’s Open-Applications Programming Interface (OpenAPI). DODS recently introduced the OPeNDAP Data Connector 

(ODC), a stand-alone Java program, which allows the search and retrieval of datasets published by OPeNDAP 

data servers. The ODC allows one to find OPeNDAP related data sets and import them into client applications such as Interactive Data Language (IDL), Matlab, (Statistical Package for the Social Sciences (SPSS), 

Excel, or into databases such as Access and Oracle, and plot them with advanced graphics capabilities. The 

ODC Search Frame provides interfaces to the GCMD and the DODS data set list. For additional information 

about the ODC, please see http://dodsdev.gso.uri.edu/ODC/.

USGS/Biological Resources Division:

The following new metadata (182 records) were provided to the USGS/BRD National Biological Information 

Infrastructure (NBII):

• Risk Assessment, Management, and Audit Systems (RAMAS) Ecological software system, 3

• Biota of Virginia (BOVA) database, 10

• Biologically Integrated Geospatial Salmonoid data Access and Management (BIGSAM), 13

• University of Tennessee, 16

• Patuxent Wildlife Research Center (PWRC) software, 9

• PWRC data, 4

• Brooklyn Botanic Garden Herbarium Catalog

• New York Metropolitan Plant Occurrence 

• Patuxent Software metadata, 9

• Leetown Science Center, 19

• Southern Appalachian Information Node, 94

• Amphibian Research Monitoring Initiative, 3

ESIP/FIND:

The Federation of ESIP brings together government agencies, universities, nonprofit organizations, and 

businesses in an effort to make Earth Science information available to a broader community. Members of 

the Federation continue to provide DIFs and SERFs to the GCMD, which the GCMD also makes available 

through the Federation of Information for Networked Discovery (FIND) on the Federation home page. The 

Federation added 685 new DIFs and 53 new SERFs for a total of 3,817 DIFs and 156 SERFs in the GCMD. 
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The GCMD is represented on the information and technology committee, e-journal committee, and the 

products and services committee. The GCMD staff members have also presented posters and given technical 

workshops at Federation meetings.

JCADM/AMD: 

The Antarctic Master Directory (AMD) is an effort coordinated with the Joint Committee Antarctic Data 

Management (JCADM) to offer Antarctic data collected by researchers from 15 of the Antarctic Treaty 

countries. Data may be searched through the AMD portal, which was created in 2001, and is located at http:

//gcmd.nasa.gov/Data/portals/amd/. In 2003, portals were added for the following AMD nodes: Argentina, 

Belgium, Finland, Canada, Switzerland, Japan, and the United States. These portals are available at http:

//gcmd.nasa.gov/Data/portal_index.html. Over 593 additional new DIFs were received from the following nodes: 

Australia, United States, Argentina, Spain, United Kingdom, Estonia, and New Zealand. In addition, the 

Australian Node from the Australian Antarctic Data Centre (AADC) has installed the final MD8 software 

and tools.

IODE:

Representatives from the GCMD coordinated with International Oceanographic Data and Information Exchange (IODE) for the release of the MEDI metadata tool to the IODE community. The Marine Environmental 

Data Information (MEDI) tool is available online from the IODE Web site. GCMD continues to actively 

participate in IODE technical and scientific meetings. Meeting notes and proceedings are available online 

at http://iode.org/. As a part of the outreach effort of the IODE community, the GCMD is currently featured 

within the Ocean Portal (http://www.oceanportal.org), a high-level directory of ocean data and information 

related Web sites. The objective of the ocean portal is to assist scientists and other ocean experts in locating 

data and information. 

NOAA:

Collaborations continued with NOAA during 2003. The entire NCDC metadata content was retrieved from 

the NOAA Server, translated from the FGDC/Content Standard for Digital Geospatial Metadata (CSDGM) 

to DIF, and loaded into the GCMD (completed April 2003). An effort was also initiated to replace outdated NOAA metadata content from other NOAA centers with updated information. A NOAA portal (http:

//gcmd.nasa.gov/Data/portals/noaa/) was created to feature over 1,586 NOAA data sets referenced in the 

GCMD. The “model output” portal, created in 2002 as a result of collaborations with the NOAA NOMADS 

project, exceeded 600 metadata records, (see http://gcmd.nasa.gov/Data/portals/models/).

NCAR: 

Collaborations continued with the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR). A portal was created (http://gcmd.nasa.gov/Data/portals/ncar/) to feature data offered by NCAR. The GCMD staff also began 

working with NCAR’s Community Data Portal (CDP). The CDP staff created an XSL Style Sheet to convert 

their XML metadata to DIF XML. As a result, 34 new DIFs were contributed to the GCMD from CDP. The 

total NCAR metadata collection in the GCMD reached 472 DIFs in 2003. Additional DIFs are expected in 

2004, as NCAR’s Data Support Section (DSS) is expected to archive almost the entire archive of European 

Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecast (ECMWF) ERA-40 Model Data.

GLOBEC: 

Collaborations with the GLOBEC community have continued. GLOBEC has continued to contribute to the 

GLOBEC portal by creating records from data collected in the Georges Bank and the Southern Ocean. 
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The project has continued to promote their portal by featuring the GCMD within their Web site (GLOBEC 

Metadata Inventory and Information (http://www.pml.ac.uk/globec/Data/metadata.htm).

Graduate Summer Student Program:

Through the work of a student in the Graduate Summer Student Program (GSSP) at GSFC, the GCMD experimented with database structures in machine parsable format, which are associated with the semantic Web. 

The semantic Web provides the ability to search for semantic relationships among any DIF terms within an 

ontology, without the need to change the database structure when new classes and relationships are added. 

The real advantages occur when an ontology is enriched. The diagram above illustrates “Sesame” (an open 

source, Resource Description Framework [RDF] schema-based repository and query facility) middleware 

and its flexibility as a graphical user interface (GUI) or application programming interface (API), using 

alternative databases.

Java

Application

Sesame

Sesame

Ontology

GCMD

Database

http Protocol Handler

Admin Module

Query?

Client 1

HTTPHTTP

SOAP

Client 2 Client 3

Request Module

Soap Protocol Handler

Query Module Export Module

Repository Abstraction Layer

-RDF DIF Files

-Ontologies

-DIF Schema

GCMD Repository

UNEP/GRID: 

Mr. Viktor Pusztai from the United Nations Environmental Programme/Global Resource Information 

Database (UNEP/GRID) of Budapest (Hungary) has been working to integrate the PostgreSQL database 

into the MD software. His valuable contribution through the CEOS IDN community will provide an opensource alternative to the Oracle database. Mr. Pusztai has taken the current Structured Query Language 

(SQL) scripts to create the tables, indexes, views, triggers, etc., and is rewriting them in order to set up the 

same database structure in PostgreSQL. He is also making modifications to the MD software necessary to 

interact with this database.

University of Virginia:

The University of Virginia group, led by Dr. Worthy Martin, presented the final report on their thesaurus 

work as part of an Earth Science Technology Office (ESTO) award. The thesaurus is currently running on 

a development machine at GCMD. It has the ability to query the Oracle database for terms and allows users to edit the terms already in the database. The thesaurus, however, is not able to accept new terms to be 

added to the database.
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GOSIC/GTOS:

GOSIC at the University of Delaware (in Lewes, Delaware), coordinates the data activities of the Global 

Observing System (GOS), which consists of the Global Terrestrial Observing System (GTOS), the Global 

Ocean Observing System (GOOS), and the Global Climate Observing System (GCOS). The GCMD, in collaboration with GOSIC and GTOS representatives, identified new science keywords and added them to the 

GCMD database. Scripts were created to allow the direct query of DIFs from GOSIC interfaces. In October 

2003, the GCMD presented a status report on the GCMD-GOSIC collaboration to the GOSIC Science User 

Working Group.

IOOS/DMAC: 

The Data Management and Communications (DMAC) subsystem will combine all of the global and coastal 

components of the sustained Integrated Ocean Observing System (IOOS), and link every part of the observing system from the instruments to the users. Representatives from the GCMD, in collaboration with the 

IOOS/DMAC Metadata Working Group, contributed to the metadata section and reviewed other sections of 

the IOOS/ DMAC Implementation Plan. 

U.S. Office of Management and Budget:

As requested by the U.S. Office of Management and Budget (OMB), the GCMD developed a NASA Geospatial framework portal, highlighting geospatial data investments consisting of framework data layers. 

These framework layers include cadastral, digital ortho-imagery, elevation bathymetric, elevation terrestrial, 

government units, transportation, hydrography, and geodetic controls (see http://gcmd.gsfc.nasa.gov/Data/

portals/nasa_geo/).

5.2.9 STANDARDS

5.2.9.1 GCMD Controlled Keywords

Although it is unclear how many groups use the GCMD keywords, 12 additional organizations that use them 

were identified in 2003, bringing the known total to 23. The GCMD’s Earth science parameter and services 

controlled keywords are available at http://gcmd.gsfc.nasa.gov/Resources/valids/ and are currently used by the 

following organizations:

CEOS Interoperability Protocol (CIP)

EOSDIS Data Gateway (EDG)

EOSDIS Core System (ECS)

NASA’s Visible Earth

NASA Taxonomy

Federal Geographic Data Clearinghouse (FGDC)

Canada Centre for Remote Sensing (CCRS)/GeoConnections

Mercury/Beja Flor, Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL)

NASA Visible Earth/Earth Observatory
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DODS (also known as OPeNDAP)

NOAA (used in NOAA FGDC records as the thesauri keywords)

Metadata Enterprise Resource Management Aid (MERMAid), formally the Coral Reef Information System (CORIS)

University of California Natural Reserve System

Semantic Web for Earth and Environmental Technology (SWEET) at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL)

Digital Library for Earth system Education (DLESE) (not explicitly using them but acknowledges 

GCMD as a resource when constructing high-level DLESE controlled vocabulary)

American Geophysical Union (AGU) Cryosphere keywords (Larry Hinzman)

Global Change Data and Information System (GCDIS)

Global Observing System Information System (GOSIC)

Marine Environmental Data Inventory (MEDI)

Benguela Environment Fisheries Interaction and Training (BENEFIT)-this is the Marine Fisheries system in South Africa

Neptune, Australia National Oceans Office (see http://neptune.oceans.gov.au/)

Scalable Agent-based Information Retrieval Engine (SAIRE) at NASA/ Ames Research Center 

(ARC) (see http://saire.arc.nasa.gov/GCMD-Final/key.html)

GCMD vocabulary considered during the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute (MBARI) 

metadata workshop, October 2003.

During the year, the following additions and modifications were made: 

New or Modified Science Keywords

• Added new TOPIC: Climate Indicators

• Added 23 new Variables and 7 new Terms

• Currently (2003): 13 Topics, 117 Terms and 1219 Science Variables 

New or Modified Services Keywords

• Added 1 new Variable

• Currently (2003): 8 Topics, 43 Terms and 57 Services Variables

5.2.9.2 Data Set Content Description Standard 

 The Directory Interchange Format (DIF), see http://gcmd.nasa.gov/User/difguide/write-a-dif_v8.html.

5.2.9.3 Analytical Resources Content Description Standard 

The Services Entry Resources Format (SERF), see http://gcmd.nasa.gov/Services/write_a_serf.htm.
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5.2.9.4 International Standards Organization (ISO) 

For the ISO 9001 standards for configuration control, see http://gcmd.nasa.gov/Aboutus/software_docs/

config.html.

5.2.9.5. ISO Geospatial Metadata Standard, 19115/TC 211

GCMD representatives monitored and responded through the international community during the ISO standard process. In preparation for compliance with this standard, a cross-mapping was completed between DIF 

and ISO19115/TC211, and additions will be made to the DIF for compatibility. Mappings were also made 

between the ISO Topic and GCMD keywords. Proposals were sent to the CEOS Interoperability Forum, 

documenting the changes necessary for ISO compatibility.

5.2.9.6 FGDC and the New Geospatial One Stop 

The explicit decision to retain the DIF format for internal use, while making all DIF metadata available as 

FGDC compliant records, has proven to be an excellent one. It has provided the distinct advantage of preserving the validation of metadata through the database—a property not available through the Clearinghouse. 

It has also allowed NASA to maintain fields critical for the GCMD that are not available in FGDC. These 

fields are considered to be absolutely essential to the NASA mission. They help prevent duplicative entries 

and assist in the discovery of data sets and include the following:

• Entry ID (unique identifier for every data set); 

• Entry Title; 

• Parameters (science keywords essential for “normalization” of the database); 

• Sensor (Instrument); 

• Source (Platform, e.g., a satellite);

• Minimum/Maximum Altitude and Depth; 

• Temporal Resolution; 

• Project; 

• Data Set Language; 

• Originating Center; 

• Data Center Name (variant); 

• Data Center URL; 

• Multimedia Sample URL; 

• Multimedia Caption; 

• Related URL; and 

• IDN Node.

The GCMD’s controlled keyword vocabulary may be selected for use by the FGDC. Because FGDC has no 

formal keyword vocabulary, the keywords may be used as thematic keywords in Section 1.6.1.1 of the FGDC’s 

standard, where the Theme Keyword Thesaurus allows participants to specify a keyword framework.

NASA has met the requirements for the Geospatial One-Stop Initiative by providing information on geospatial 

acquisitions (see http://gcmd.gsfc.nasa.gov/md/lucene/luceneSearch.html).

5.2.9.7 ISO Geospatial Metadata Standard 19115/TC 211 

The release of MD9-ISO in May 2004 will bring the DIF into compliance with this ISO standard. 
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5.2.9.8 National Biological Information Infrastructure (NBII)

Work on the NBII continues through a formal, interagency agreement with the USGS Biological Resource 

Division (BRD).

5.2.9.9 Crosswalk or Mapping with Other Standards

These standards can be accessed at http://gcmd.nasa.gov/Aboutus/standards/.

• Dublin Core

• FGDC 

• NBII

• ISO 19115

5.2.9.10 Concurrent Versioning System (CVS) 

The Concurrent Versioning System is used within the project for software configuration control.

5.2.9.11 The Zen of Object Publishing Enterprise (ZOPE)

ZOPE, which is written in Python (a highly-productive, object-oriented scripting language), is used for 

internal document management and for the CEOS IDN interactions.

5.3 Goddard Earth Sciences Data and Information Systems Center/DAAC

5.3.1 ORGANIZATION, MISSION, AND STRATEGY

The Goddard Earth Sciences (GES) Data and Information Systems Center (DISC) is a part of the Global 

Change Data Center (GCDC), GSFC Code 902. The DISC provides data and services for global change 

research and education.

The GES DISC mission is to maximize the investment of NASA’s Earth Science Enterprise by providing 

data and services that enable people to realize the scientific, educational, and application potential of global 

climate data. 

As a source of information for atmospheric, hydrologic, land biosphere and ocean color data, the GES DISC 

facilitates the study of natural and human processes that influence Earth’s climate, by processing, archiving, 

distributing, and providing user and value added data management services. 

The DISC is divided into two groups:

1. The DAAC is responsible for the execution of heritage DAAC data management functions: data ingest, 

archive, production, distribution, management, and user services; system engineering; data support; science 

software integration; and the development of DAAC Unique Extensions.

The DAAC is composed of the following versions:

• Version 0 (V0)—Developed and operated by GES DAAC personnel to support data originating 

prior to 1998.

• Version 1 (V1)—Developed and operated by GES DAAC personnel to support data originating 

from TRMM, starting November 1997.
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• Version 2 (V2, also known as ECS)—Developed by the ESDIS Project and operated by the GES 

DAAC to support Terra, launched December, 1999, Aqua, launched May 2002; and the Solar Radiation and Climate Experiment (SORCE), launched January 2003.

The GES DAAC’s goal is to efficiently and cost effectively ingest, produce, archive, and distribute Earth 

Science data and information, related to hydrology, ocean biology, atmospheric dynamics and chemistry, 

and land biosphere, and to perform the data management functions and services that maximize the use and 

usefulness of this data and information.

2. The Products and Services Cooperative (PSC) is responsible for new products and services in cooperation with, and support of, the Earth science data community including the development and deployment of 

products and data management services for new projects, development of value added products such as data 

management and manipulation tools that can be reused; new technology development, new project initiatives, and product reuse.

The GES PSC uses the following criteria to take on new work:

• The new work must be useful to a group of users.

• The new work must facilitate science (e.g., add value to existing products or services).

• The new work must provide a means to improve DISC and other data center data management 

facilities, on the individual and data center levels.

The GES PSC goal is to develop, in complete collaboration with individuals being served, keep inventory, 

and provide data management products and services in response to the changing data management requirements of the Earth science community, and the development of new applications.

The figure that follows illustrates the two GES DISC organizations, i.e., the DAAC and the Products and 

Services Cooperative (PSC). 

,

.

.
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Within the GES DISC organization, four highly dependent components exist, each addressing a vital part 

of the GES DISC:

1. Engineering and system development

2. System Execution

3. Data Support

4. Science Integration

The following figure depicts the relationship between the DISC groups.

The GES DISC strategy is built upon balancing two opposing drivers: maintaining a high level of customer 

services, and performing appropriate functions within budgetary constraints. The GES DISC, therefore, uses 

the following strategies to strive toward this balance:

Engage scientists

• Communications must be frequent

• Dedicated points of contact to gather and provide information are identified

Build economically

• Look for reuse, ways to save funds

• Willing to take calculated risks; otherwise low risk

• Build to integrate new technologies

Engage employees

• Ensure that employees realize the value of their contributions

• Treat all employees equally; maintain a badgeless environment; work around distracting contractual 

issues

5.3.2 DATA SET HOLDINGS

The GES DISC holds remote sensing data for the following Earth Science disciplines:
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• Atmospheric Chemistry

• Atmospheric Dynamics

• Hydrology

• Interdisciplinary Studies

• Ocean Color

• Land Biosphere

The timeline shown below shows all mission-oriented data sets currently residing at the GES DISC. The bars 

are color coded to reflect similar continuous discipline-oriented data sets. This is a helpful view of GES DISC 

holdings, as NASA ESE moves from mission data sets, to measurement data sets to facilitate science.

The following figures illustrate discipline-specific imagery and data sources that are accessible from the 

GES DISC data holdings.
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5.3.3 DATA SYSTEMS AND TOOL HOLDINGS

The GES DISC is not only the archive for the Earth Science data just described, but it provides the kinds of 

services and tools that further facilitate the usability and accessibility of this data. The following systems and 

tools (described below) were implemented by the GES DISC, often enabling EOSDIS functionality, which 

would otherwise not be available:

• The Version 0, Version 1, and Version 2 (ECS) data management systems

• Simple Scalable Script-based Science Processor (S4P) data production system

• Web-based Hierarchical Ordering Mechanism (WHOM) interface

• Subsetting and subsampling, and format conversion tools

• Near Archive Data Mining (NADM) 

• DISC Online Visualization and Analysis System (DOVAS)

5.3.4 MAJOR ACTIVITIES AND HIGHLIGHTS

The GES DISC major activities and highlights center around the organizations’ central operations and efforts 

to improve data system operability, efficiency, data accessibility, and data usability. These activities range 

from exploring and implementing new data management technologies, to developing value added products 

and tools, to exploring advanced data center paradigms for providing user services for the sake of facilitating data usage for research and applications. In addition, much time was spent in redefining the GES DISC 

business model to ensure that all customers were being serviced in accordance with new ESE strategies. 

Most noteworthy of all is that, GES DISC strategies have evolved to focus further on discipline based data 

archives, distribution, and support. In particular, the GES DISC Web presence has been revamped, specific 

measurements have been accentuated (based on science collaborations and in-house expertise), and data 

analysis, access, and usability tools have been developed that were able to be reused for different science 

measurements

In January 2003, the SORCE mission was launched and from the beginning, has faultlessly provided data 

to the GES DISC for archiving. The addition of this data for receiving and processing two flows of MODIS 

data, plus a flow of AIRS data, has been met with great success.

GES DISC highlights in 2003 and their impacts, organized by DISC groups, are described in the following 

subsections.

5.3.4.1 GES DISC System Engineering

The GES DISC Engineering staff is primarily responsible for maintaining the integrity, currency, and usability of GES DISC operational systems, as well as taking on many new innovative activities that add very 

worthwhile functions to the GES DISC arsenal of data management capabilities.

Expanded Use of the S4P System: S4P was self initiated and developed by the GES DISC as an alternative 

data processing engine for new missions needing a simple way to execute data-driven science algorithms. 

S4P lends itself to be easily portable to the DISC’s main processing system, as well as scientist site data 

processing environments. S4P’s success is reflected in the fact that it has been reused four times, including 

integration into ECS, and has provided a capability previously unavailable to various projects. This year, 

S4P replaced the ECS Planning and Data Processing System (PDPS) as the sole data production engine for 

these instruments: MODIS (Terra, processing and reprocessing); MODIS (Aqua, processing and reprocessing, 
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when it starts); and AIRS. This ‘simpler’ processing engine has been almost maintenance free, drastically 

reducing the ESDIS Project’s custom software maintenance costs.

NADM Environment: The success of last year’s Data Mining activities associated with TRMM data, lead to 

the development of the NADM environment. Given that the first operation scientists often perform on newly 

acquired data is extract subsets of the data based on their research interests, the NADM environment affords scientists the opportunity to have their first data reduction operations done in a secure environment at 

the GES DAAC. This provides the advantage of only having to transmit, receive, and store a much smaller 

data set at the scientist’s site, and frees up the scientist’s computer for more analytical processes. By cleverly 

marrying this environment to the GES DAAC Data Pool (a Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks [RAID] 

archive that cycles the latest data produced for MODIS and AIRS on- and off-line, providing quick and easy 

data access), large volumes of the most current data are being reduced in size, and immediately captured by 

scientists. For global data researchers, this (and the subsampled data generated by the GES DAAC) is the 

only way to acquire MODIS data in a meaningful way.

Advanced Technology Research for Data Management Applications: GES DAAC made great strides in researching, analyzing, and in some cases, prototyping promising advanced technologies for the ultimate 

purpose of enhancing the usefulness of Earth science data systems in retrieving specific desirable datain short, to bring data management systems to the next level of maturity in serving increasingly more 

sophisticated users. Three areas were studied:

1. Conceptual architectures for intelligent archives that would enable users to extract derived information from data holdings;

2. Neural networks that can help identify and classify significant events captured in remote sensing 

data; and

3. Machine learning techniques for decision support in intelligent data management.

5.3.4.2 GES DISC System Execution

The System Execution team is responsible for the operations of the GES DISC active archive systems, ensuring 

that the system produces, archives, and distributes data properly, and the system is operating optimally.

Procedural Accomplishments: In conjunction with the MODIS Science Team, the GES DISC began, and 

successfully completed, the MODIS data reprocessing for each MODIS mission data set, resulting in fully 

validated level-1 data (and counting) produced and archived. In addition, the GES DAAC operations staff, 

operate the data management system continuously, and are now very knowledgeable about the behavior 

of the system, was able to take advantage of increasing throughput rates. With the system being tuned to 

maximize data throughput, rates of greater than 4X (4 times the amount of data moving through the system 

than is being ingested from the instrument, e.g., 24 hours of level-0 data being processed to level-1b in 6 

hours) and data processing requests exceeding 10,000 per 24 hours, became common place-well over system 

requirements.

All known ECS procedures (planned and unplanned) have been documented during this period, allowing 

the operations staff to perform more efficiently, more independently, and with greater responsibility. 

Data Archive Accomplishments: In archiving over 1 PB of data in ECS, and 40 TB of data in the Version 0/1 

systems, the GES DISC had a number of accomplishments:
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• Routinely ingested data from the MODIS Processing System (MODAPS).

• Processed and distributed special requests of data in support of major field campaigns.

• During the MODIS Collection 4 Reprocessing, and MODIS Terra and Aqua processing, over 3 TB of 

MODIS data were archived per day.

• From instrument turn on, all AIRS data was processed with no major glitches.

• Entertained over 2500 requests for MODIS data per month, consistently, as well as over 2000 users of 

heritage data.

• Added hardware to enhance ECS processing.

The following figures illustrate the production, archive, and distribution metrics at the GES DAAC:

MODIS PRODUCTION: 1X = ~ 460 GB/day
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Archive Summary of MODIS/AIRS Data

Amount per 

Month [TB]

Sustained*

Total Amount 

to Date [PB] “On the Floor” 

Currently [PB]

GSFC 82 1.3 ~1.1

*November 2003 to January 2004 averaged
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June 2003- March 2004

Ingest and Archive

VERSION 0/VERSION 1 DATA SETS

June 2003- March 2004

Distribution

VERSION 0/VERSION 1 DATA SETS

5.3.4.3 GES DISC Data Support

The Data Support Team (DST) consists of science-trained and engineer-trained people who support GES 

DISC data. Each member of the DST specializes in GES DISC discipline-specific (listed below) data holdings. DST members not only provide user and data support, but they also are tasked to develop value-added 

products, requiring small efforts, are often pursued by the DSTs. Another major task of the DST is to acquire 

and make available NOAA National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) ancillary data products 

to all ESE DAACs:
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Developing Value Added Products, Tools, and Documentation: The GES DISC DST developed additional 

extensions to the EOSDIS Core System (ECS) to enhance operability (e.g., metrics tools, data manipulation tools, user requested interfaces), essential for reporting progress and system efficiency. In addition, the 

team developed software to create value added products for TRMM, MODIS, and AIRS, such as regional 

subsetting, on-demand channel subsetting, subsampling, multiple data ordering tool, data conversion to GIS 

and binary formats, and data mining. These tools address two user specified data access issues: the large 

minimum volume that can be shipped, and the need to provide data in alternative formats.

The release of MODIS products, now accessible and being used by the public, is greatly aided by extensive 

search-and-guide documentation prepared by the GES DISC DST, meeting the standards of EOSDIS and 

satisfaction of the users.

Recognizing the diversity of data access protocols (again, one size does not fit all) and in response to user 

requests, the GES DISC is addressing the needs of its users by developing the Universal Data Reduction 

Server to serve data using various protocols. 

Many new value added data products are available through the GES DISC:

• All post-boot TRMM Precipitation Radar (PR) products;

• Six new TRMM ground validation (GV) data products processed by the University of Washington 

and delivered regularly to TSDIS;

• MODIS subsetted products for the CloudSat Project;

• Special subsets of the Data Assimilation data in support of the Compact Disk-Read Only Memory 

(CD-ROM) assembled for the Southern African Regional Science Initiative (SAFARI) campaign; 

and

• Various data sets, which can be viewed through the Web-based Geographic Information Systems 

(WebGIS) client as GIS levels.

In addition, GES DAAC subsetting software was modified to support the new Goddard Earth Observing 

System (GEOS-4) Assimilation data products provided by the GMAO.

Science Support and Collaboration: The GES DAAC began a mutually beneficial relationship with the United 

Nation’s World Food Programme in which the GES DAAC provides remote sensing imagery and captures 

to support articles relating climate with food production. With this new application for NASA data comes 

popularity, as additional organizations are learning the usefulness of NASA Earth science data for applications research.

Responding to Data Support Needs: GES DAAC personnel, with the objective of providing a better understanding of GES DAAC data and services to selected communities, initiated and/or participated in several 

workshops:

• Initiation of the data support workshop for AIRS science team members to further enhance and describe the GES DAAC services that will (at the time) soon support AIRS,

• Initiation of the MODIS Oceans Products Workshop at the 2003 Ocean Sciences Meeting, and

• Initiation of an ocean color data seminar at the College of Marine Sciences at the University of South 

Florida.

Prior to the delivery of the ECS user interface, the GES DISC successfully adapted and reused the Version 

0/Version 1 Web-based Hierarchical Ordering Mechanism (WHOM) as an interface to accessing MODIS 

data. The WHOM reuse has proven not only to be a user friendly alternative for accessing MODIS data, but 
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a reliable backup to the EOSDIS interface (EOSDIS Data Gateway or EDG), and currently a more popular 

means to access MODIS data at the GES DISC.

The GES DISC provides a full suite of user services, from telephone and e-mail support to the recently 

implemented MODIS Frequently Asked Questions Web page. The GES DISC fully understands the various 

levels of service that may be provided, and strives for the highest affordable level. In fact, a preliminary version of a Data Center Levels of Service model had been circulated by the GES DISC.

GES DAAC personnel gave papers or presentations at several notable conferences and workshops throughout 

2003 to promote the use of GES DISC data and services:

• Fall AGU—Presented poster papers and hosted the GES DAAC booth;

• International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium (IGARRS)—Presented poster papers and 

one presentation paper;

• ESE Federation—Presented papers; and

• American Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing (ASPRS)—Presented poster papers and 

hosted the DAAC-wide booth.

DISC On-Line Visualization and Analysis System (DOVAS): The GES DISC has developed this tool to quickly 

serve up online data and allows the user to visualize specific spatial areas, create plots and histograms of 

the selected data, and provides ASCII lists of the data. The tool has been modified so that it can be easily 

reused by simply specifying different online data products. Thus far, DOVAS has been used for TRMM data 

products (hydrology), MODIS (aerosol data), and agricultural applications data. (See Sect. 5.3.4.5, below, for 

a discussion on the Cooperative Agreement Notice [CAN].) Additional instantiations are planned. DOVAS 

lends itself nicely as a measurement based science analysis tool. The following exemplifies the top-level 

user interface for DOVAS. 

Web-Based Online Analysis Tool

Instead of ordering

large files, users select

geophysical parameter(s),

area, and time interval,

and get results in

seconds.

Output:

-Numerical (ASCII)

-2D plots

-Correlations

-Animation
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5.3.4.4 GES DISC Science Integration

The GES DISCs Science Integration group ensures that science software and associated documentation is 

integrated into the DISC data systems.

Taking science software from one development environment and integrating and testing it into the GES DISC 

has proven to be an important, and precise effort. GES DAAC personnel now integrate MODIS level-1 science software for two MODIS processes, as well as a full suite of AIRS data processing software. The GES 

DISC Science Integration group has improved the efficiency of the MODIS Science Software Integration and 

Test (SSIT) process, thereby more easily accommodating new and sudden changes to science software (also 

known as Product Generation Executables [PGEs]) resulting from instrumentation changes and necessary 

calibration Look-up Tables (LUTs) changes, with little effect to the science team. 

The Science Integration group was also involved with two major activities:

• Active involvement in the MODIS Data Processing Review. Personnel not only provided much information to the MODIS Team Leader regarding MODIS level-1 processing and data archive, but also 

wrote major sections of the Review Preparation White Paper, and presented at the review. This exercise 

resulted in much greater coordination between the principal investigator (PI) processing system and 

the GES DAAC.

• A self initiative to better understand the issues related to ordering and receiving data from ECS. The 

Data Order and Delivery Group (DODGr) uncovered many inefficiencies and system bugs as it stepped 

through the data ordering process. As the study proceeded, finding were addressed immediately and 

system improvements were realized quickly. The final reports came later.

5.3.4.5 GES DISC-Wide Highlights

There were a number of GES DISC-wide activities.

The GES DISC was very active in proposing relevant work to the NASA CAN, Earth Science Research, 

Education, and Applications Solutions Network (Earth Science REASoN). The GES DISC was very successful on the following winning proposals:

a. PI—Integrating NASA ESE Data into Global Agricultural Decision Support Systems (Steve Kempler)

b. Co-I—Development and Maintenance of An Ocean Color Time Series (Watson Greg, PI) 

c. Provided letters of support—

• A Thematic Data Portal to Satellite-Derived Ocean Surface Properties: Discovery and Access 

(Peter Cornillon, PI) 

• GENESIS-II: Data Fusion and Analysis for Multi-Sensor Earth System Science (Thomas Yunck, 

PI) 

• The Invasive Species Data Service: Towards Operational Use of ESE Data in the USGS Invasive 

Species Decision Support System (John Schnase, PI)

d. SEEDS—The GES DAAC provided much informational experience to the very important ESE Data 

Management initiative regarding the evolution of Earth science data management systems. In light of 

decreasing computing prices, advancing computer technologies, and the community desire to maximize 

the availability of Earth science data, the GES DAAC supported several of the SEEDS areas of study, 

including cost of data center modeling, science data levels of service, governance of distributed data 

management systems, and data life cycle preparations for long term data stewardship.
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e. ESE Federation—The GES DAAC continued to participate in key activities that lead to further maturing the Federation. 

f. Global Precipitation Mission (GPM)—The GES DISC participated in the GPM Planning Workshop 

and submitted a technical and cost proposal for the data system.

5.4 GMAO Computer System Group

Gi-Kong Kim of Code 902 is leading the Computing Systems Group (CSG) of 900.3/GMAO. The GMAO 

develops and uses models and assimilation systems to conduct research that advances understanding of climate variability and changes. The CSG is responsible for the following functional areas of GMAO.

Systems engineering:

• Information and configuration management

• GEOS system testing and verification

• GEOS system operations

• GEOS operational software development and maintenance

• GEOS data user support

The current GMAO Data Assimilation System (DAS) in use for routine DAS data production is the GEOS-4 

system. The GEOS-4 system consists of the atmospheric general circulation model (GCM) called the finite 

volume GCM (fvGCM), and the statistical analysis system called the Physical-Space Statistical Analysis 

(PSAS). The GEOS-4 system operation generates 8 first-look and 13 late-look DAS products daily in support of the EOS instrument teams and also generates near-real time forecasts twice a day to support field 

experiment missions.

5.4.1 SYSTEM DEVELOPMENT AND MAINTENANCE

Since October 2002, when the GEOS-3 system was replaced with the GEOS-4 DAS system, the GEOS-4 

system underwent two major system upgrades. The first upgrade was implemented in April 2003. This system 

release produced improved quality of skin temperature and humidity at near surface resulting in reduction 

of noise manifested in the spatial distribution of the data in high latitude regions.

The second GEOS-4 system release, which was implemented operationally in October 2003, made significant improvements in various data quality, particularly those parameters that are to be used by the EOS 

Clouds and Earth’s Radiant Energy System (CERES) instrument team. The land surface model (LSM) was 

replaced with a new model called the Community Land Model (CLM) in the second system release. The 

CSG successfully implemented the two system releases. The CSG led the interaction with external interface 

elements such as ECS, DAAC, and EOS instrument teams to coordinate the planning for the GEOS-4 system 

upgrades and tests. 

The migration of GMAO high-end computing from ARC to the GSFC NASA Center for Computational 

Sciences (NCCS) was successfully completed in early September 2003, which was ahead of schedule. The 

CSG led the initial planning activities involving the GSFC NCCS and ARC. The migration was performed 

in phases such that computing workload that was less dependent on data was moved first. The GEOS operation was moved in the last phase to mitigate risks due to inherent instability in the NCCS system in the early 

period. The CSG played a critical role by providing system engineering-related consultation to the NCCS. 

The CSG also took the initiative to form a technical working group to plan and implement the porting of the 

GEOS-4 system to the Compaq architecture as part of the migration. This system porting was completed 

in time so that the production and system development could use the large Compaq computer at NCCS in 
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addition to the Silicon Graphics Inc. (SGI) platforms. The CSG provided close assistance to NCCS in relocating more than 150 TB of data. The migration of GEOS-4 system operation was carefully planned including 

sufficient system testing to ensure the smooth operation at NCCS before the computing systems at Ames for 

GMAO were turned off. 

In preparation for the EOS Aura satellite launch in 2004, the GMAO has been collaborating with the Aura 

instrument teams and also with the atmospheric chemical transport modeling community, to define the GEOS 

data products requirements for the users. The CSG led the feasibility study to understand the system development effort required and to estimate cost and implementation schedule. The GMAO presented the result of 

the study and proposal for the operational production of eta-level DAS data products in a Aura science team 

meeting. The CSG led the development of the eta-level DAS products file specification and coordinated the 

document review by the users. It is expected that the production of the eta-level DAS products will start in 

time to support the Aura instrument teams.

5.4.2 GEOS SYSTEM OPERATIONS

The GEOS-4 operations have produced all the First-Look and Late-Look data products in the forward processing stream without any serious anomalies. In addition to the forward processing, the CSG production 

team successfully completed the GEOS-4 reprocessing using the v4.0.2 for the MODIS instrument team in 

mid-August 2003, as planned. The reprocessed GEOS-4 data products for January 2000 through April 2003 

were successfully archived at ECS/GSFC DAAC.

The production of DAS data for the TRMM period—called the TRMM reanalysis using the GEOS-3 system 

with a new capability to assimilate the precipitation observations—was successfully completed in March 

2004. The analysis was done for the time period spanning December 1997 through December 2001. This was 

the first time that the spaceborn precipitation observations were assimilated in a reanalysis project.

The GEOS-4 data production operation successfully completed the near-real time support for the pre-Aura 

Validation Experiment (PAVE) conducted in January 2004. The PAVE used GEOS-4 5-day forecasts generated twice a day in the mission planning for flights from Houston to Costa Rica. 

The GEOS operations team in the CSG completed the production of the GEOS-4 reanalysis for the CERES 

team for the period from February 2000 through March 2004, according to the agreement between the 

GMAO and CERES signed in October 2004. The CERES reanalysis using the frozen GEOS-4 system will 

cover the time period spanning from 1978 through March 2004, while the forward processing will continue 

to produce two late-look type data until 2007.

More details on the GEOS production operations can be obtained at the following URL: http://gmao.gsfc.nasa.gov/

operations/.

5.5 SeaWiFS Data System

Two Global Change Data Center civil servants support the SeaWiFS Project, as well as the development and 

operations of the SeaWiFS Data System. For details of SeaWiFS Data System and its operations, refer to the 

NASA GSFC Laboratory for Hydrospheric Processes Annual Report. 
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5.6 TRMM Science Data and Information System

5.6.1 ORGANIZATION

TSDIS is the data and information processing facility for TRMM. TSDIS processes data from the three 

TRMM satellite instruments: the Visible and Infrared Scanner (VIRS), the TRMM Microwave Imager (TMI), 

and the Precipitation Radar (PR). TSDIS also ingests ground validation radar data from TRMM investigators and from the TRMM Office and catalogs associated metadata information in its database. All TRMM 

data products are sent to the GSFC DAAC for long-term archive. TSDIS provides data product browse and 

ordering support to a select group of investigators (e.g., TRMM algorithm developers, the TRMM instrument scientists, and TRMM data quality scientists). The general public accesses TRMM data through the 

Goddard DAAC.

TSDIS also provides science support to the TRMM algorithm developers. This support includes evaluation 

of algorithms in the TSDIS Integration and Test Environment (ITE) and development of data display tools.

5.6.2 FACILITY

The main computing resources consist of a distributed array of SGI computing platforms, which are partitioned 

into processing streams. These streams are aligned with particular TRMM instruments and with the type of 

processing (i.e., initial processing or reprocessing). The system is sized to ensure that satellite data can be 

processed well within 24 hours of receipt for initial processing. For reprocessing, the system was originally 

sized to generate data products at a rate of 2 data days per day. Upgrades have significantly enhanced this 

capability to beyond 6 data days per day.

Hewlett Packard (HP) computers are used to house the database, the automated scheduler, and Openview 

(task monitoring software). Data Direct Networks (DDN) RAID, NetApp, and Unitree storage devices provide large online and near-line storage capabilities. These large storage capabilities are especially helpful 

to speed reprocessing and algorithm testing, because the starter files are resident at TSDIS and they do not 

have to be retrieved through the DAAC pipeline.

A personal computer (PC) provides a link to the Science Data Processing Facility (SDPF), which supplies 

level-0 data and ephemeris files to TSDIS. Because the SDPF is now highly automated (known as Packet 

Processor-Automated, or Pacor-A), this link is essential for TSDIS operators to access needed files when 

problems occur with the SDPF server when that facility is not staffed. Upon request, TSDIS also can access 

files for retransmission to JAXA under these circumstances. JAXA (formerly the National Space Development Agency, or NASDA) is NASA’s partner in the TRMM mission.

TSDIS also serves as an intermediary for sending instrument command requests and Quick Look data requests from the TRMM instrument scientists to the Mission Operations Center (MOC).

5.6.3 MAJOR ACTIVITIES

5.6.3.1 Science Support

TRMM Fire Product: The fire data were reprocessed at the request of users. There were discussions with several 

investigators who used the TRMM fire data in scientific papers that they published in the Journal of Geophysical Research (JGR) and Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics (ACP). The TRMM Fire Product generation is 

part of an ongoing effort. For more information, contact Dr. Yimin Ji (yji@tsdis.gsfc.nasa.gov).
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Merged Rainfall Products: Intercomparisons were produced among rain gauge, TRMM satellite, and 

NOAA/Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit (AMSU) satellite rain estimates in support of science algorithm improvements and microwave rain product merging activities. Network connections were established 

between TSDIS and NOAA to acquire NOAA real-time infrared (IR) and microwave rain products for the 

ongoing merged product work. For more information, contact Dr. Yimin Ji (yji@tsdis.gsfc.nasa.gov).

Preparation for TRMM Version 6 Data Reprocessing: Whereas the commencement of reprocessing was delayed 

until April 2004, much advance work was still needed to test and prepare revised science algorithms. TSDIS 

performed integration and testing for new versions of most of the science algorithms. The analyses of the 

tests included generation of statistics on individual granules, and the creation of time series, zonal analyses, 

joint probability distributions between algorithms, and profiles of reflectivity data.

The tests of each successive candidate Version 6 algorithm showed the incremental change of that version 

and revealed that the 2A25 and 2B31 algorithms were producing illegal values (Institute of Electrical and 

Electronic Engineers (IEEE) NaN or “Not a Number”). The algorithm developers fixed their algorithms so 

as to not write the illegal values.

Previous testing for Version 5 and earlier versions of the algorithms used one month of test data. For Version 6, TRMM scientists requested more extensive testing. Tests that were four months in duration were run 

repeatedly in the Integration and Testing Environment (ITE). In addition, longer tests of 16 months, which 

included the TRMM satellite altitude boost month of August 2001, were run in the ITE. In order to accommodate the 20 times larger test data set, TSDIS made the analysis procedures more efficient. Additionally, 

analyses were developed that included distributions of each of the 20 Rain Types as defined by algorithm 

2A23, profiles of algorithm 2A25 radar reflectivity data, zonal averages for the Pacific Ocean only, and zonal 

averages of level-2 data using algorithm 3G68. Of particular interest to the PR Science Team has been the 

behavior of the PR reflectivity and rainfall rate profiles as a function of storm height. Statistics of the profiles 

were generated to assist the PR Science Team in evaluating the improvement in rainfall estimates by the 

2A25 algorithm (see the first figure below).

The first long test was run starting in July 2003. The test results showed that the algorithms, as of July 2003, 

had significant differences in their rainfall estimates. The second figure below shows the zonal mean surface 

rain rate of each level-2 rain algorithm for the year 2001. TRMM scientists presented and discussed these 

results at the Precipitation Science Team Meeting in October 2003. At that meeting, they decided to delay 

the start of Version 6 reprocessing until the algorithms could be improved even more to reduce the disagreement in rainfall estimates. After further modifications to the algorithms, a second long test commenced in 

December 2003 and continued into 2004.

The following figure shows vertical profiles of mean reflectivity from the nadir ray of the PR instrument for 

convective and stratiform (with bright band) rain types. The profiles are further split into land and ocean 

cases. Bin 0 is closest to the spacecraft while bin 79 is defined as the Ellipsoid Bin. The different profiles in 

each graph are separated by storm height or, in the case of stratiform rain, the height of the bright band. 
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The figure shown below is the zonal mean surface rainfall rates for the TRMM level-2 rain algorithms for 

the year 2001. Zonal mean rainfall rates were calculated from the first long test of candidate Version 6 algorithms, which were run in July 2003.

For more information, contact Dr. John Kwiatkowski (johnk@tsdis.gsfc.nasa.gov) regarding the PR 

algorithms, Dr. Yimin Ji (yji@tsdis.gsfc.nasa.gov) regarding the VIRS and TMI algorithms, and Mr. 

John Stout (stout@tsdis.gsfc.nasa.gov) regarding the combined algorithms. 

5.6.3.2 Data and Information Processing

TRMM data products were generated for the satellite instruments. In 2003, 68,878 data products were 

created for initial processing. Each product represents a granule (i.e., 1 orbit) of data. The data products 

include level-1a through level-3b. Browse images (i.e., low resolution images used for product ordering) 

and Coincident Subsetted Intermediate (CSI) products between ground sites and TRMM overpasses were 

also created. A total of 6,107 browse images and 171,257 CSI products were generated.

No reprocessing was done in 2003. The TRMM Science Team scheduled the Version 6 reprocessing to 

begin in April 2004. In addition, no GV data products were received in 2003. Transfers from the TRMM 

Office are expected to resume in 2004.

Availability of the processing system continued to be high. Total system availability for the year was 

98.3%. Of the 1.7% downtime experienced, 0.8% was unplanned. The remaining downtime, 0.9%, was 

scheduled, including system upgrades and routine maintenance.
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5.6.4 HIGHLIGHTS

TRMM PR Sensitivity Studies: Sensitivity studies were performed for the 2A25 PR rainfall algorithm. These 

studies were coordinated with the JAXA/Earth Observing Research Center (EORC) in Japan. The studies 

made use of previously measured drop size distribution data and new techniques for retrieving path-integrated attenuation. Work in this area focused on the use of the Surface Reference Technique and its use in 

the 2A25 retrieval algorithm. This is an on-going study. For more information, contact Dr. John Kwiatkowski 

(johnk@tsdis.gsfc.nasa.gov).

Disdrometer Drop Size Distribution (DSD) Study: A technique has been developed to incorporate drop size 

distributions obtained from disdrometer measurements into the TRMM PR rain retrieval algorithm. This 

is being done in coordination with U.S. TRMM science team members. The primary goal of this work is to 

facilitate the inclusion of field campaign data into the TRMM satellite rain retrieval algorithms. Work was 

performed in collaboration with JPL and the 2B31 algorithm developer to assess retrieval differences between 

the combined and radar-only algorithm. This is an ongoing study. For more information, contact Dr. John 

Kwiatkowski (johnk@tsdis.gsfc.nasa.gov).

Determination of TRMM Spacecraft Attitude Using PR Data: A study continued in 2003 for developing and 

implementing a method for estimating the TRMM spacecraft attitude using data directly measured by the 

PR. Specifically, the interest was in the spacecraft roll in the across-track plane. The method turned out to be 

very reliable and it is independent of onboard attitude errors. This technique was used extensively during and 

after the TRMM altitude boost for attitude monitoring when the TRMM Earth Sensors failed and alternate 

means of attitude control were implemented. Work in 2003 concentrated on using the technique to estimate 

pre-boost attitude errors (back to mission launch in 1997) for use during the Version 6 reprocessing cycle. 

For more information, contact Dr. John Kwiatkowski (johnk@tsdis.gsfc.nasa.gov).

PR Ocean Retrieval Validation: Collaboration was initiated with Dr. Sandra Yuter (Univ. of Washington) regarding the PR satellite rainfall retrievals off the Eastern coast of South America. This area is of particular 

interest to Dr. Yuter because it is relatively dry with very low storm heights. The purpose of this work is to 

isolate possible satellite algorithm inconsistencies with ship-borne radar data. For more information, contact 

Dr. John Kwiatkowski (johnk@tsdis.gsfc.nasa.gov).

Data Format Activities: The TSDIS prototype data format system was used to create example formats for a 

hypothetical “Chinese Radiometer” and the radiometer on Megha-Tropiques. The resulting formats were 

presented at a GPM Data Working Group meeting in February in College Park, Maryland. For more information, contact Mr. John Stout (stout@tsdis.gsfc.nasa.gov). 

Upgrades to the Data Processing System: An additional 16 TB of storage was ordered to enhance TSDIS 

capacity. In addition, wireless networking equipment was ordered to enhance TSDIS networking capability. 

Both of these upgrades will be installed in 2004. Finally, changes are being made to the facility operating 

systems, moving away from proprietary systems to Linux. For more information, contact Mr. Charles Cosner 

(Charles.M.Cosner@nasa.gov).

Hurricane Isabel Study: As Hurricane Isabel approached the Mid-Atlantic States in September 2003, the 

TRMM satellite overflew the storm an unusually large number of times in the storm’s life cycle. The TRMM 

PR observed Hurricane Isabel six times, which is more times than the PR has seen with any other individual 

hurricane. What was especially significant was that the PR swath was effectively centered on the eye of the 

storm in each instance. In the future, this unique set of observations may help scientists understand how the 

heavy rain in a hurricane’s eyewall evolves during the hurricane’s lifetime. The composite image shown on 
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the cover (of this report) also shows the wider field of view of the TRMM Microwave Imager (TMI). The 

TMI collects passive microwave data that are similar to, but at a higher resolution than, the data of existing SSM/I instruments. Even after Hurricane Isabel struck the U.S. East Coast and forced the evacuation 

of NASA GSFC, TSDIS continued to provide near-real time monitoring of the heavy rain associated with 

Hurricane Isabel.
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6. EDUCATION AND PUBLIC OUTREACH

GCMD

January 8: Interviewed by Janet Ormes and Gail Hodge for a chapter on Ontologies and Knowledge 

Codification being written for a book on Knowledge Management Technologies and Applications at NASA at the request of Dr. Jay Liebowitz, Code 300.

May 6–8: THematic Real-time Environmental Distributed Data Services (THREDDS) in Boulder, 

Colorado. Presented summary of GCMD activities as they relate to THREDDS data discovery 

efforts.

May 15–17: ESIP Federation Meeting at the University of Maryland. Gave presentation and demo of 

GCMD activities related to the Federation Interactive Network for Discovery (FIND) during 

the Federation Technical Workshop and participated in the Federation Showcase Demo and 

Poster session.

June 4–7: EDG/EOSDIS Clearinghouse (ECHO) meeting at GSFC, with keyword presentation.

TSDIS

TSDIS continued to answer researchers’ questions about how to visualize TRMM data using the Orbit 

Viewer and to take suggestions for future enhancements to the Orbit Viewer. In 2002, contacts in the United 

States include researchers at the University of New Mexico, Hofstra University in New York, Earth Science 

Information Partner-3 (ESIP-3) in California, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), University of 

Iowa, and George Mason University in Virginia. In addition, TSDIS responded to questions about the Orbit 

Viewer from researchers in the following countries: Brazil, Canada, China, Germany, India, and Japan. For 

more information, contact Owen Kelley (okelley@tsdis.gsfc.nasa.gov).

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APPENDIX 1. PRESENTATIONS AND PUBLICATIONS

GCMD:

Koken, P., W.T. Piver, F. Ye, A. Elishauser, L.M. Olsen, and C.J. Portier, 2003: “Temperature, Air Pollution, 

and Hospitalization for Cardiovascular Diseases Among Elderly People in Denver,” Environ. Health 

Perspectives, 111, 1,312–1,317.

Northcutt, T., and L. Olsen, June 2003: “Protecting Goddard Network Resources Via Transparent Network 

Bridges and Port Knocking Techniques,” Director’s Discretionary Fund Presentation, NASA Goddard 

Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, Maryland.

Olsen, L., 2003a: “CEOS International Directory Network Newsletter,” #16, http://gcmd.gsfc.nasa.gov/pipermail/

interop/2003-August/000013.html.

— , 2003b: “Overview and Demonstration of the Global Change Master Directory. Existing and Emerging 

Capabilities of the Global Change Master Directory,” ESSAC Subcommittee on Information Systems 

and Services (ESISS), Washington, D.C.

Olsen, L.M., 2003a: “CEOS International Directory Network Newsletter,” #15, http://gcmd.gsfc.nasa.gov/

pipermail/interop/2003-April000011.html.

— , 2003b: “International Standards for Scientific Data and Open Source Products—An Analogy,” presented 

at Science Data Centers Symposium, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland.

— , G. Major, S. Leicester, K. Shein, J. Scialdone, H. Weir, S. Ritz, C. Solomon, M. Holland, R. Bilodeau, 

T. Northcutt, and R. Vogel, 2003: NASA/Global Change Master Directory, Earth Science Keywords,

Version 4.2.2, http://gcmd.nasa.gov/Resources/valids/keyword_list.html.

Reitsma, F., and L. Olsen, 2004: “Spatial Data Accessibility and the Semantic Web.” SCISW2003, (submitted).

Ritz, S., 2003: “Locating and Referencing NASA Terra and Aqua Data and Data-Related Services Using 

NASA’s Global Change Master Directory,” Poster presentation, 19th Conf. Interactive Information and 

Processing Systems (IIPS) Session, Amer. Meteorol. Soc. Annual Meeting, Long Beach, California. 

GES DISC (all proceedings references are available on CD-ROM from the conference sponsors):

Acker, J., W. Esaias, G. Feldman, and S. Kempler, 2003: “Coloring the coastal zone: SeaWiFS and MODIS 

data for aquatic resources management.” Proc. Coastal Zone 2003, Baltimore, Maryland.

Ahmad, S., J. Johnson, and C.H. Jackman, 2003: “Atmospheric products from the Upper Atmosphere Research Satellite (UARS).” Adv. Space Res., 32, 1,807–1,812.

Ahmad, S.P., P.K. Bhartia, R.D. McPeters, J.R. Herman, C.G. Wellemeyer, O. Torres, A.J. Krueger, and J.E. 

Johnson, 2003a: “Ozone, aerosols, and other atmospheric products from new version-8 TOMS algorithm.” 

Proc. AGU 2003 Fall Meeting, San Francisco, California.

— , P.F. Levelt, P.K. Bhartia, E. Hilsenrath, G.W. Leppelmeier, and J.E. Johnson, 2003b: “The OMI atmospheric science data products.” Proc. AGU 2003 Fall Meeting, San Francisco, California.
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— , P.F. Levelt, P.K. Bhartia, E. Hilsenrath, G.W. Leppelmeier, and J.E. Johnson, 2003c: “Atmospheric 

data products from the Ozone Monitoring Instrument (OMI).” Proc. SPIE Int. Symp. Optical Sci. Technol.—Remote and In-Situ Sens., San Diego, California.

Chiu, L., Y. Xing, and A. Chang, 2003: “Variations of oceanic evaporation observed from SSM/I.” Proc. 

AGU 2003 Fall Meeting, San Francisco, California.

Cho, S., J. Qin, J. Li, and A.K. Sharma, 2003: “Atmospheric Infrared Sounder data at NASA GES DISC 

DAAC.” Proc. 2003 AMS Annual Meeting, Long Beach, California.

Gopalan, A., G. Leptoukh, K. Yang, A. Savtchenko, and J.Y. Li, 2003: “New MODIS atmosphere joint product 

available from GES DAAC and the effects of spatial sampling on the MODIS cloud mask.” Proc. AGU 

2003 Fall Meeting, San Francisco, California.

Johnson, J., and S. Ahmad, 2003a: “SORCE data products and services at the NASA GES DAAC.” Proc. 

2003 EGS–AGU–EUG Joint Assembly, Nice, France.

— , and — , 2003b: “Atmospheric chemistry data at the NASA Goddard Earth Sciences DAAC.” Proc. 

IUGG, Sapporo, Japan.

— , — , and S. Kempler, 2003: “Accessing the EOS Aura atmospheric data products.” Proc. AGU 2003 

Fall Meeting, San Francisco, California.

Leptoukh, G., D. Ouzounov, A. Savtchenko, L. Lu, N. Pollack, Z. Liu, J. Johnson, J. Qin, S. Cho, J.Y. Li, S. 

Kempler, W. Teng, and L. Gonzalez, 2003: “HDF/HDF-EOS data access, visualization and processing 

tools at the GES DAAC.” Proc. IGARSS 2003 Meeting, Toulouse, France.

Liu, Z., L. Chiu, W. Teng, and H. Rui, 2003a: “Precipitation products, tools and services for supporting global 

water cycle studies and applications.” Proc. 30th Int. Symp. Remote Sens. Environ., Honolulu, Hawaii.

— , H. Rui, W. Teng, and L. Chiu, 2003b: “Application of NASA Earth Science Enterprise products.” COAA 

Scientific Workshop, Univ. of Maryland, College Park, Maryland.

— , — , — , and — , 2003c: “Online analysis and visualization of TRMM and QuikSCAT products.” 

Proc. 12th Conf. Interactions Sea and Atmos., 2003 AMS Annual Meeting, Long Beach, California.

— , — , — , and — , 2003d: “Online intercomparison of TRMM and global gridded precipitation 

products.” Proc. 17th Conf. Hydrol., 2003 AMS Annual Meeting, Long Beach, California.

Lynnes, C., S. Berrick, L. Gerasimov, A. Gopalan, X. Hua, P. MacHarrie, D. Ouzounov, S. Shen, P. Smith, 

K. Yang, K. Wheeler, and C. Curry, 2003: “Applications of Bayesian classification to content-based data 

services.” Proc. AGU 2003 Fall Meeting, San Francisco, California.

Ouzounov, D., G. Leptoukh, A. Savtchenko, J.Y. Li, and B. Teng, 2003a: “HDF-EOS HDFLook data processing and visualization applications at GES DAAC.” Proc. AGU 2003 Fall Meeting, San Francisco, 

California.

— , A. Savtchenko, G. Leptoukh, D. Yuan, A. Gopalan, J.Y. Li, S. Cho, J. Qin, G. Vicent, B. Teng, and S. 

Kempler, 2003b: “Aqua MODIS and AIRS products available from NASA GES DAAC.” Proc. AGU 

2003 Fall Meeting, San Francisco, California.
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Pollack, N., W. Teng, J. Bonk, L. Lu, D. Nadeau, P. Hrubiak, and G. Serafino, 2003: “A Web interface for 

accessing GES DAAC GIS data.” Proc. ASPRS 2003 Annual Conf., Anchorage, Alaska.

Qin, J., S. Cho, J. Li, C. Phelps, and D. Sun, 2003a: “AIRS data and support at the GES DISC DAAC.” Proc. 

2003 EGS-AGU-EUG Joint Assembly, Nice, France.

— , — , C. Phelps, and J. Li, 2003b: “NASA GES DISC DAAC holdings for AIRS.” Proc. IGARSS 2003,

Toulouse, France.

— , J. Li, S. Cho, L. Lu, and E. Ocampo, 2003c: “AIRS/AMSU-A/HSB data and support at NASA GES 

DISC DAAC.” Proc. AGU 2003 Fall Meeting, San Francisco, California.

Rui, H., B. Teng, J. Bonk, L. Chiu, Z. Liu, P. Hrubiak, N. Pollack, L. Lu, and G. Serafino, 2003a: “TRMM 

data reprocessing and new data products.” Proc. 2003 AMS Annual Meeting, Long Beach, California.

— , W. Teng, L. Chiu, and Z. Liu, 2003b: “TRMM data at the GES DISC DAAC and their applications to 

monitoring tropical cyclones.” Proc. IUGG, Sapporo, Japan.

Savtchenko, A., D. Ouzounov, A. Gopalan, and D. Yuan, 2003: “MODIS data from Terra and Aqua at the 

GES DAAC.” Proc. IGARSS 2003 Meeting, Toulouse, France.

Teng, W., J. Johnson, and S. Ahmad, 2003: “The SORCE science data products available at the NASA GES 

DAAC.” Proc. AGU 2003 Fall Meeting, San Francisco, California.

Vicente, G.A., 2003: “Access and use of NASA satellite remote sensing data/products and applications to 

infectious diseases control.” Proc. Inter-American Workshop on the Use of Remote Sensing to Control 

Infectious Diseases, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.

Xing, Y., L. Chiu, and A. Chang, 2003: “Diagnostic studies of global oceanic evaporation variations.” Proc. 

AGU 2003 Fall Meeting, San Francisco, California.

Yuan, D., and A. Savtchenko, 2003a: “Can we reproduce the realistic surface horizontal heat advection in 

the equatorial Pacific Ocean with assimilation of the Reynolds sea surface temperature?” Proc. AGU 

2003 Fall Meeting, San Francisco, California.

— , and — , 2003b: “Horizontal sea surface temperature gradients: MODIS satellite observations versus 

Reynolds analysis.” Proc. 2003 EGS–AGU–EUG Joint Assembly, Nice, France.

— , — , A. Gopalan, and J. Acker, 2003: “MODIS ocean primary productivity and the thermocline circulation during the 2002–2003 El Niño.” Proc. AGU 2003 Fall Meeting, San Francisco, California.

TSDIS (all proceedings references are available on CD-ROM from the conference sponsors):

Ji, Y., and E. Stocker, 2003a: Reply to comment by Giglio et al. on “Seasonal, Intra-seasonal, and Interannual Variability of Land Fires and their effect on the Atmospheric Aerosols.” J. Geophys. Res., 108, 4755 

ACH 4: 1–6.

— , and — , 2003b: “Ground validation of TRMM and AMSU microwave precipitation estimates.” Proc. 

2003 IEEE Int. Geosci. Remote Sens. Symp., July 21–25, 2003, Toulouse, France.
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— , and — , 2003c: “TRMM fire algorithm, product and applications.” Proc. 2003 IEEE Int. Geosci. 

Remote Sens. Symp., July 21–25, 2003, Toulouse, France.

Okamoto, K., and R. Meneghini, T. Iguchi, J. Awaka, N. Takahashi, S. Shimizu, J. Kwiatkowski, J. Stout, 

2003: “TRMM Version 6 PR Algorithms.” Poster presentation, Precipitation Science Team Meeting, 

Greenbelt, Maryland.
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APPENDIX 2. ACRONYMS

AADC Australian Antarctic Data Centre

ACP Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics

AGU American Geophysical Union

AIRS Atmospheric Infrared Sounder

AMD Antarctic Master Directory

AMSU Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit

API Application Programming Interface

ASDC Atmospheric Sciences Data Center

ASPRS American Society for Photogrammetry and Remote Sensing

BENEFIT Benguela Environment Fisheries Interaction and Training

BIGSAM Biologically Integrated Geospatial Salmonoid data Access and Management

BOVA Biota of Virginia

BRD Biological Resources Division

CAN Cooperative Agreement Notice

CCRS Canada Centre for Remote Sensing

CCRS Canadian Centre for Remote Sensing

CDP Community Data Portal

CD-ROM Compact Disk-Read Only Memory

CEOS IDN Committee on Earth Observation Satellites’ International Directory Network

CERES Clouds and Earth’s Radiant Energy System

CIP CEOS Interoperability Protocol

CLIVAR Climate Variability and Predictability

CLM Community Land Model

CORIS Coral Reef Information System

CSDGM Content Standard for Digital Geospatial Metadata

CSG Computing Systems Group

CSI Coincident Subsetted Intermediate

CVS Concurrent Versioning System

DAAC Distributed Active Archive Center

DAO Data Assimilation Office

DAS Data Assimilation System

DDN Data Direct Networks

DF Hierarchical Data Format

DIF Directory Interchange Format

DISC Data and Information Systems Center

DLESE Digital Library for Earth System Education

DMAC Data Management and Communications

DODGr Data Order and Delivery Group

DODS Distributed Oceanographic Data System

DOVAS DISC Online Visualization and Analysis System

DSD Drop Size Distribution

DSS Data Support Section

DST Data Support Team

DSWG Data System Working Groups
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ECHO EOSDIS Clearinghouse

ECMWF European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecast

ECS EOSDIS Core System

EDG EOSDIS Data Gateway

EORC Earth Observation Research Center (Japan)

EOS Earth Observing System

EOSDIS Earth Observing System Data and Information System

ES Earth Science

ESDIS Earth Science Data and Information Systems

ESE Earth Sciences Enterprise

ESIP Earth Science Information Partner

ESTO Earth Science Technology Office

FGDC Federal Geographic Data Committee

FIND Federation of Information for Networked Discovery

FvDAS Finite Volume Data Assimilation System

FvGCM Finite Volume General Circulation Model

GB Gigabyte

GCDC Global Change Data Center

GCDIS Global Change Data and Information System

GCM General Circulation System

GCMD Global Change Master Directory

GCOS Global Climate Observing System

GEOS Goddard Earth Observing System

GES Goddard Earth Sciences

GHRC Global Hydrology Resource Center

GIS Geographic Information Systems

GISD Geographic Information for Sustainable Development

GLOBEC Global Ocean Ecosystems Dynamics program

GMAO Global Modeling and Assimilation Office

GOFC Global Observation of Forest Cover 

GOOS Global Ocean Observing System 

GOSIC Global Observing System Information Center

GPM Global Precipitation Mission 

GRID Global Resource Information Database

GSFC Goddard Space Flight Center

GSSP Graduate Summer Student Program

GTOS Global Terrestrial Observing System

GUI Graphical User Interface

GV Ground Validation

HP Hewlett Packard

IDL Interactive Data Language

IEEE Institute of Electrical and Electronic Engineers

IGARSS International Geoscience and Remote Sensing Symposium

IODE International Oceanographic Data and Information Exchange

IOOS Integrated Ocean Observing System

IR Infrared
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ISO International Standards Organization

IT Information Technology

ITE Integration and Test Environment

JAXA Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency

JCADM Joint Committee on Antarctic Data Management

JGR Journal of Geophysical Research

JPL Jet Propulsion Laboratory

LAS Live Access Server

LDA Local Database Agent

LSM Land Surface Model

LUT Look Up Table

MBARI Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute

MD Not an acronym, but the name of software.

MEDI Marine Environmental Data Information

MERMAiD Metadata Enterprise Resource Management Aid

MIT Massachusetts Institute of Technology

MOC Mission Operations Center

MODAPS MODIS Adaptive Processing System

MODIS Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer

MSFC Marshall Space Flight Center

MuTPE Museums Teaching Planet Earth

NADM Near Archive Data Mining

NaN Not a Number

NASDA National Space Development Agency (Japan)

NBII National Biological Information Infrastructure

NCAR National Center for Atmospheric Research

NCCS NASA Center for Computational Sciences

NCDC National Climatic Data Center

NCEP National Centers for Environmental Prediction

NetApp Network Appliance

NOAA National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration

NSIDC National Snow and Ice Data Center

ODC OPeNDAP Data Connector

OMB Office of Management and Budget

OpenAPI Open-Applications Programming Interface

OPeNDAP Open-source Project for a Network Data Access Protocol

OPS Operations Facility

ORNL Oak Ridge National Laboratory

Pacor-A Packet Processor-Automated (part of the SDPF)

PAVE Pre-Aura Validation Experiment

PC Personal Computer

PDPS Planning and Data Processing System

PGE Product Generation Executable

PR Precipitation Radar

PSAS Physical-space Statistical Analysis System
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PSC Products and Services Cooperative

PWRC Patuxent Wildlife Research Center

RAID Redundant Array of Inexpensive Disks

RAMAS Risk Assessment, Management, and Audit Systems

RDF Resource Description Framework

RFC Request for Comments

RSMAS Rosenstiel School of Marine and Atmospheric Science

S4P Simple Scalable Script-based Science Processor

SAFARI Southern African Regional Science Initiative

SAIRE Scalable Agent-based Information Retrieval Engine

SDPF Sensor Data Processing Facility

SeaWiFS Sea-viewing Wide Field-of-view Sensor

SEDAC Socioeconomic Data and Applications Center

SEEDS Strategic Evolution of Earth Science Enterprise Data Systems

SERF Services Entry Resource File

SGI Silicon Graphics Incorporated

SORCE Solar Radiation and Climate Experiment

SPSS Statistical Package for the Social Sciences

SQL Structured Query Language

SSIT Science Software Integration and Test

SSM/I Special Sensor Microwave/Imager

SWEET Semantic Web for Earth and Environmental Technology

TB Terabyte

THREDDS Thematic Real-time Environmental Distributed Data Services

TMI TRMM Microwave Imager

TRMM Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission

TSDIS TRMM Science Data and Information System

UNEP United Nations Environmental Programme

USGS United States Geological Service

USRA University Space Research Association

UWG User Working Group

V0 Version 0

V1 Version 1

V2 Version 2

VIRS Visible and Infrared Scanner

WCRP World Climate Research Programme

WDCs World Data Centers

WebGIS Web-based Geographic Information Systems

WHOM Web-based Hierarchical Ordering Mechanism

WWF World Water Forum

XML Extended Mark-up Language

ZOPE Zen of Object Publishing Enterprise

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9. SPONSORING / MONITORING AGENCY NAME(S) AND ADDRESS (ES)

11. SUPPLEMENTARY NOTES

 June 2004 Technical Memorandum

Global Change Data Center Annual Report:

Mission, Organization, Major Activities, and 2003 Highlights 902

Global Change Data Center

 TM–2004–212753

 

Report for 2003 of the Global Change Data Center.

Rapid, efficient access to Earth sciences data from satellites and ground validation stations is fundamental to the nationʼs efforts to understand the effects of global environmental changes and their 

implications for public policy. It becomes a bigger challenge in the future when data volumes increase 

from current levels to terabytes per day. Demands on data storage, data access, network throughput, 

processing power, and database and information management are increased by orders of magnitude, 

while budgets remain constant and even shrink.

The Global Change Data Centerʼs (GCDC) mission is to develop and operate data systems, generate 

science products, and provide archival and distribution services for Earth science data in support of 

the U.S. Global Change Program and NASAʼs Earth Sciences Enterprise. The ultimate product of the 

GCDC activities is access to data to support research, education, and public policy.

Global Change Data Center, Global Change Master Directory, Global 66

Precipitation, SeaWiFS, TRMM.

 2004-01781-0