IMPLICATIONS OF EARTH CORE REPOSITORY PRACTICES FOR BUILDING A GEOSCIENCES CYBERINFRASTRUCTURE

Geological earth cores are a valuable resource, both literally—incredibly expensive to obtain or replace—and figuratively—as critical infrastructure for conducting research in the earth sciences. Furthermore, cores are a diminishing resource because analyzed samples are often destroyed or not returned. Thus, in order to maximize the value derived from these cores, it is important to develop well-defined curation strategies, linking the research data with the original core. Creating such a platform to support digital management of physical samples has long been a major goal of the EarthCube iSamplES. Initiatives such as DESC, IGSN and IEDA have advanced the intellectual and technical infrastructure for sample identification, registration, and data curation, including the use of domain-specific ontologies (Mayernik et al., 2016) and cross-disciplinary data modeling (Hsu et al., 2017).

In order to facilitate wide adoption of developed standards and infrastructures, we investigated current core repository technologies that serve as drivers for, and hindrances to, the adoption of new technology in the operational environment. We examined policies that may facilitate or impede the integration of core data and research results. In this presentation, we describe the decision-drivers of three multi-location earth core repositories (USGS CRC, IODP, and BEG) with diverse policy mandates that serve different communities. Our interviews revealed that, although repository inventories are available online, the software and metadata standards vary across repositories, and even across facilities within a repository. While all repository managers were aware of IGSNs, none have plans to implement SESAR, or its associated web services. Common reasons for lack of adoption included unclear immediate gains for the institution, insufficient resources, lack of governance mandates by funding agencies, and lack of available expertise to adopt new software and train staff in using the new system. Recording and integration of research data received from scientists as well as the policies for return of samples also varied significantly across repositories. Strategies for incentivizing the adoption of standards-based data practices in order to maximize the reach of research data generated with core samples are discussed.

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Session No. 353--Booth# 66

T143. Curating Physical Samples in a Digital World (Posters)

Wednesday, 25 October 2017: 9:00 AM-6:30 PM

Halls 4EF (Washington State Convention Center)

Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs. Vol. 49, No. 6
doi: 10.1130/abs/2017AM-303324

© Copyright 2017 The Geological Society of America (GSA), all rights reserved. Permission is hereby granted to the author(s) of this abstract to reproduce and distribute it freely, for noncommercial purposes. Permission is hereby granted to any individual scientist to download a single copy of this electronic file and reproduce up to 20 paper copies for noncommercial purposes advancing science and education, including classroom use, providing all reproductions include the complete content shown here, including the author information. All other forms of reproduction and/or transmittal are prohibited without written permission from GSA Copyright Permissions.

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