THE TETHYS DATABASE: A WEB-BASED GIS

The application of interdisciplinary research in the geosciences is often hindered by difficulties in data compilation and dissemination and by the high costs of data acquisition. Variations in scale of existing data sets, their extremely uneven documentation, and the relative scarcity of user-friendly access tools have been major obstacles to interdisciplinary research in the Tethyan belt. The advent of internet based interfaces to GIS datasets, which combine GIS' massive potential for data integration, visualization, and modeling with the internet's ability to widely disseminate data, provides new opportunities to geoscientists.

Researchers at SUNY Buffalo, UIC, UMC, & UH are collaborating to develop a web-based GIS that incorporates a wide range of data sets for areas affected by the Tethys tectonic belt. The Tethys database is intended to facilitate interdisciplinary research on plate collisions through the compilation, integration, analysis, visualization, and distribution of raw and processed data sets over the Earth's most active zone of seismicity and volcanism.

Co-registered data sets currently available on line include: false color Landsat TM data (bands 2,4,7 at 30 m resolution) ; SRTM derived elevation (30 arc second and 3 arc second spatial resolution); geologic maps (1:5,000,000); Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectrometer (MODIS), bands 1-7 (500m resolution); Grace gravity model; SIR-C total power images (150m resolution); seismological properties of the crust and upper mantle; seismic hazard data; & global population density data. Major & trace element abundances, radiometric ages, and isotopic abundances for ophiolites, ultra-high pressure metamorphics, and collision-related magmatic bodies, geodetic data, & focal mechanisms will be added shortly. Metadata is available in FGDC compliant format. We developed customizations to our ARCIMS interface to provide basic image processing capabilities (e.g., stretching, extraction of spectra, color composites, etc). These tools are largely missing from the majority of the available web-based GIS software. The developed tools allow users to manipulate, combine, and interpret image data together with other GIS data layers directly on the web site.

URL: http://isis.geology.buffalo.edu/tethys.htm, http://garnet.geosc.uh.edu/Tethys