DEVELOPMENT OF DATA INTEGRATION AND INFORMATION FUSION INFRASTRUCTURE FOR EARTH OBSERVATION

The 10 Year Implementation Plan for a Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS), which was endorsed at the Third Earth Observation Summit in Brussels in February, 2005, emphasizes the importance of data management facilities for diverse and large-volume Earth Observation data from inhomogeneous information sources. A three year research plan for addressing this key target of GEOSS has just approved as the first step by the Japanese government. The goals of this research are, (1) to develop a data management core system consisting of data integration and information fusion functions and interoperability and information service functions; (2) to establish data and information flows between data providers and users; (3) to promote application studies of data integration and information fusion, especially in the fields of weather forecasting, flood forecasting, agricultural management, and climate variability and changes. The research group involves leading scientists on information science and technology, who have been developing giant data archive servers, storage area networks, metadata models, ontology for the earth observations. They are closely cooperating with scientists on earth sciences, water resources management, and agriculture, and establishing an effective collaborative research framework.