Earth sciences represent the most complicated branch of science in
terms of informatics. There are some specific reasons for such
complexity. First of all, the scale range inside which the Earth
sciences are operating goes from the atomic up to planetary scale.
Secondly, there is no other branch of science, which envelops so many
different disciplines, combining the field object description and
sampling with strong statistical analysis, mathematical modeling and
computational experiment. For instance, during a routine field work,
the geologist deals with mineralogy, structural geology, tectonics,
geophysics, geochemistry, environmental sciences, etc. Each one of
the exemplified disciplines provides a lot of information itself, not
to talk about the modeling - the most powerful computer ever existed
has been designed for atmospheric modeling in the frames of Japanese
Earth Simulator program. The third complication is derived from the
spatial/temporal snapping and variability of data and therefore of
functional models, which strongly depend on the local conditions.
Ideally, any bit of information in the field of Earth sciences should
be attributed with geographic coordinates; otherwise it will be just
impossible to properly analyze multidisciplinary data in the frames
of any specific project or to create any future panorama with
acceptable probability to hit upon the reality. Fortunately,
revolutionary development of geographic informational systems (GIS)
at the end of last century has provided us with a powerful toolbox
for spatial data management. But, still, GIS is the toolbox designed
for geography, being the main Earth sciences features different from
the pure geographic ones, and, thus, requesting some specific
applications and skills in addition to classical GIS.
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