TOWARDS A REFERENCE PLATE TECTONICS AND VOLCANO ONTOLOGY FOR SEMANTIC SCIENTIFIC DATA INTEGRATION

<>Introduction

  <>When scientific progress depends on integration of data across disciplines, it is critical for the users in the diverse disciplines to have access to the data in terms they can understand and use.  Ontologies provide a method for encoding terms, term meaning, and term inter-relationships in a machine interpretable format.  In a geology setting, this means that ontologies provide a way of representing geologic terms and their associated properties. These encodings can enable interoperability and interdisciplinary data integration by allowing end users and agents to access precise, operational term definitions.  <>In support of a NASA-funded scientific application (SESDI ; Semantically Enabled Science Data Integration Project; (http://sesdi.hao.ucar.edu/ ) that needs to share volcano and climate data to investigate relationships between volcanism and global climate, we have generated a volcano and plate tectonic ontologies.  Our goal is to create reference ontologies–  open terminology representations meant to be shared and reused by a broad community of users interested in the subject area as well as to provide access to key volcanology and plate tectonic related databases. We recognize that many of the features and products of volcanism are related to plate tectonic processes, thus the availability of both ontologies allows us to map data associated with volcanic events, such as gas and particle ejecta to plate tectonic settings and processes. Our goal is to support investigations into links between volcanism and climate change.  This goal can be more rigorously addressed through semantic integration of data associated with the atmospheric response to volcanism and its plate tectonic setting.

  <>Volcano Ontology

 

        The near and far field effects of volcanic activity are common geologic phenomena observed in many parts of the world and may include possible catastrophic damage near eruptive centers as well as measurable affects on global climate. A comprehensive categorization of types of volcanic activity and its episodic nature is a challenging scientific goal that requires access to many known types of geologic and sensor data.  We gathered leading volcano and scientific ontology experts to capture necessary conceptual relationships between data and phenomena associated with volcanism (Sinha et.al, 2006, McGuinness et.al, 2006).  Figure 1 depicts some of the results of this meeting in the form of a concept map.  Our representation documents the terms and their relationships.  Such representations are requirements for ontology-supported access to data and integration tools. Three high level classes associated directly with volcanism were identified: volcanic systems, volcanic phenomena and climate .The concept of volcanic systems was linked to both plate tectonic and geologic environments for providing links between eruptive style,           

 

 

Figure 1. A class diagram representing the framework for linking data to volcanic features and processes. 

 

magmatic composition and the location of the volcanic field.  Additional concepts related to volcanic systems include magma plumbing, eruption environment and the 3-D geometry of the volcanic field. Deformation, eruption, landslides, biologic activity, atmospheric disturbance, hydrothermal alteration, magma motion, and earthquakes were considered as subclasses of a higher level class called phenomena. The two classes phenomena and volcanic systems are linked through materials, i.e., magma and its products. This organization of concepts contains associations with all data types used by geologists to monitor active volcanic systems and to study volcanoes preserved in the geologic record.

  <>Plate Tectonics Ontology

 

The dynamic interaction of lithospheric plates and their interaction with hot spots is closely related to all classes of volcanic phenomenon. We gathered leading plate tectonics and scientific ontology experts and created a plate tectonics ontology that focuses on terminology expected to be used in semantic integration of data associated with volcanic activity and its plate tectonic setting (Figure 2). We established a high level class structure representing the concept of lithospheric plates, as well the subclasses that are associated with such features. The concept of a plate was treated as an independent class to permit the association of plate boundaries with this concept. For example, a divergent plate boundary has organizational relationship with back arc spreading center and a spreading ridge. Similarly, the subclass of convergent plate boundary contains convergent margin which in turn is the parent of features such as fore-arc, arc axis or back arc. These are some of the more common plate tectonic settings associated with volcanism, and its relationship to composition variability in volcanic products is one of the key research goals of SESDI. It was also established that plates have intraplate and plate margin settings which often contain volcanoes associated with possible hot spot activity.

 

Figure 2. Class diagram relating plate tectonic features and their products. <>  <>Discussion and Conclusion

  <>Ongoing climate modeling efforts (e.g. Robock, 1989, 1991) have ascribed gaseous emissions, especially sulfur dioxide, hydrogen sulfide and hydrogen fluoride as the most significant gases capable of changing climate over periods of decades. For example, ongoing NASA efforts of studying volcanic SO2 loading using Total Ozone Mapping Spectrometer (TOMS; Volcanic Emissions Group, http://toms.umbc.edu/) shows emission relationships between arc and non arc volcanoes  Our work towards creating reference plate tectonics and volcano ontologies is aimed at facilitating scientific data integration in such interdisciplinary settings. Our newly developed high level volcano and plate tectonic ontologies are being used to help clarify the relationships between total emissions and plate tectonic settings (noting in particular that these relationships are not unique).  One conclusion is that the field require a more sophisticated ontology for volcanoes and plate tectonics prior to extending current models associating climate change with volcanic activity. 

 

 

Acknowledgement:

 

 SESDI is a semantic science data integration project sponsored by NASA Advancing Collaborative Connections for Earth-Sun System Science  (ACCESS) and NASA Earth-Sun System Technology Office (ESTO) under  award AIST-QRS-06-0016.

  <>References

 

Deborah L. McGuinness, A. Krishna Sinha, Peter Fox, Rob Raskin, Grant Heiken, Calvin Barnes, Ken Wohletz, Dina Venezky, Kai Lin. Towards a Reference Volcano Ontology for Semantic Scientific Data Integration. American Geophysical Union Joint Assembly, Baltimore, Maryland, May 23-26, 2006.

Robock, A., 1989: Volcanoes and climate. In Climate and Geo-Sciences: A Challenge for Science and Society in the 21st Century, A. Berger, S. Schneider, J. Cl. Duplessy, Eds., NATO ASI Series, Series C, Mathematical and physical sciences, no. 285, (Kluwer, Dordrecht), 309-314.

Robock, A., 1991: The volcanic contribution to climate change of the past 100 years. in Greenhouse-Gas-Induced Climatic Change: A Critical Appraisal of Simulations and Observations, M. E. Schlesinger, Ed., (Elsevier, Amsterdam), 429-444.

Sinha, A.K., Heiken.G., Barnes,C., Wohletz,K., Venezky,D., Fox., McGuinness.,  Raskin. and Lin,K, 2006, Towards an ontology for Volcanoes, U.S.Geological Survey Scientific Investigations Report 2006-5201, p.51