Collaborative Research: SI2-SSI: Landlab: A Flexible, Open-Source Modeling Framework for Earth-Surface Dynamics

合作研究：SI2-SSI：Landlab：灵活的开源地球表面动力学建模框架

• 批准号: 1450338
• 负责人: Nicole Gasparini
• 金额: $ 53.23万
• 依托单位: Tulane University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2015
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2015-08-01 至 2020-07-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1450338&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Collaborative; Research; SI2; SSI; Landlab

Earth scientists discover and predict the behavior of the natural world in part through the use of computer models. Models are used to study a wide range of phenomena, such as soil erosion, flooding, plant growth, landslide occurrence, and many other processes. Models can be used to develop scientific understanding by comparing model calculations with the real world. They can also be used to make predictions about how nature will behave under certain conditions. In the areas of geosciences that deal with the earth's surface, one bottleneck in the development and use of models is the effort required to build, test, and debug the necessary software. This project contributes to scientific research and discovery by creating open source software tools that scientists can use to more efficiently create, modify, or combine computer models that represent portions of earth's surface and the processes occurring thereon. The project combines software development with user training and web-based resources, so that the products will be openly accessible, well documented, and widely disseminated within the relevant scientific communities. The project also contributes to K-12, undergraduate, and graduate-level education in computational modeling and earth-surface processes.This project catalyzes research in earth-surface dynamics by developing a software framework that enables rapid creation, refinement, and reuse of two-dimensional (2D) numerical models. The phrase earth-surface dynamics refers to a remarkably diverse group of science and engineering fields that deal with our planet's surface and near-surface environment: its processes, its management, and its responses to natural and human-made perturbations. Scientists who want to use an earth-surface model often build their own unique model from the ground up, re-coding the basic building blocks of their model rather than taking advantage of codes that have already been written. Whereas the end result may be novel software programs, many person-hours are lost rewriting existing code, and the resulting software is often idiosyncratic, poorly documented, and unable to interact with other software programs in the same scientific community and beyond, leading to lost opportunities for exploring an even wider array of scientific questions than those that can be addressed using a single model. The Landlab model framework seeks to eliminate these redundancies and lost opportunities, and simultaneously lower the bar for entry into numerical modeling, by creating a user- and developer-friendly software library that provides scientists with the fundamental building blocks needed for modeling earth-surface dynamics. The framework takes advantage of the fact that nearly all surface-dynamics models share a set of common software elements, despite the wide range of processes and scales that they encompass. Providing these elements in the context of a popular scientific programming environment, with strong user support and community engagement, contributes to accelerating progress in the diverse sciences of the earth's surface.The Landlab modeling framework is designed so that grid creation, data storage, and sharing of data among process components is done for the user. The framework is generic enough so that the coupling of two process components, whether they are squarely within a geoscience subdiscipline, or they cross subdisciplines, is the same. This architecture makes it easy to explore a wide range of questions in the geosciences without the need for much coding. Further, the model code is primarily written in Python, a language that is relatively easy for casual programmers to learn. Because of these attributes, the Landlab modeling framework has the potential to add computational modeling to the toolbox of a wide array of geoscientists, and to clear a path for trans-disciplinary earth-surface modeling that explores societally relevant topics, such as land-cover changes in response to climate change, as well as modeling of topics that currently require the coupling of sophisticated but harder-to-use models, such as sediment source-to-sink dynamics. The project will generate several proof-of-concept studies that are interesting in their own right, and demonstrate the capabilities of the modeling framework. Community engagement is fostered by presenting clinics and demonstrations at professional venues aimed at hydrologists, sedimentologists, critical zone scientists, and the broader earth and environmental sciences community. The team also supports visits by individual scientists for on-site training beyond these clinics. Input/output tools allow compatibility with data from relevant NSF-supported research. The project supports four graduate students and three postdoctoral researchers, and also includes modeling workshops for fifth to seventh grade girls in a community that has a greater than 50% minority population.

地球科学家通过使用计算机模型发现并预测自然世界的行为。模型用于研究广泛的现象，例如土壤侵蚀，洪水，植物生长，滑坡出现以及许多其他过程。模型可通过将模型计算与现实世界进行比较来发展科学理解。它们还可以用来预测自然在某些条件下的行为。在涉及地球表面的地球科学领域，模型开发和使用中的一个瓶颈是建立，测试和调试必要软件所需的努力。该项目通过创建开源软件工具来为科学研究和发现做出贡献，科学家可以使用这些工具来更有效地创建，修改或组合代表地球表面部分及其过程中发生的过程的计算机模型。该项目将软件开发与用户培训和基于Web的资源相结合，以便在相关科学社区中公开访问，记录良好并广泛传播产品。该项目还通过开发一个软件框架来促进地球表面动力学的研究，从而为K-12，本科和研究生水平的教育做出了促进，从而促进了地球表面动力学的研究，该软件框架可以快速创建，改进和重新使用二维（2D）数字模型。短语地球表面动力学是指一个非常多样化的科学和工程领域，涉及我们星球的表面和近地表环境：其过程，其管理以及其对自然和人为扰动的反应。想要使用地面模型的科学家通常会从头开始构建自己的独特模型，重新编码其模型的基本构件，而不是利用已经编写的代码。最终结果可能是新颖的软件程序，但许多人小时都会重写现有的代码，并且所产生的软件通常是特质的，记录的较差，并且无法与同一科学界及其他地区的其他软件程序进行互动，从而导致探索更广泛的科学问题的机会，而不是可以使用单个模型来解决的科学问题。 LandLab模型框架旨在消除这些裁员和失去的机会，同时通过创建一个用户和开发人员友好的软件库来降低进入数值建模的标准，该库为科学家提供了对地球表面动力学建模所需的基本构建块。该框架利用了这一事实，即尽管它们包含了广泛的过程和量表，但几乎所有表面动力学模型都共享一组常见的软件元素。在大众的科学编程环境中提供这些要素，并在强大的用户支持和社区参与度下，有助于加速地球表面科学的进步。地表建模框架的设计是为用户设计的，以便为用户完成了网格创建，数据存储以及过程组件之间的数据共享。该框架足够通用，因此两个过程组件的耦合，无论它们是在地球科学细胞范围内，还是跨越子学科的耦合，都是相同的。这种体系结构使得无需大量编码即可轻松探索地球科学中的广泛问题。此外，模型代码主要用Python编写，这种语言对休闲程序员来说相对容易学习。 Because of these attributes, the Landlab modeling framework has the potential to add computational modeling to the toolbox of a wide array of geoscientists, and to clear a path for trans-disciplinary earth-surface modeling that explores societally relevant topics, such as land-cover changes in response to climate change, as well as modeling of topics that currently require the coupling of sophisticated but harder-to-use models, such as sediment source-to-sink动力学。该项目将生成几项概念验证研究，这些研究本身就很有趣，并证明了建模框架的功能。社区参与是通过针对水文学家，沉积物学家，关键区科学家以及更广泛的地球和环境科学社区的专业场所展示诊所和演示来培养的。该团队还支持各个科学家的访问，以在这些诊所以外的现场培训。输入/输出工具允许与相关NSF支持的研究的数据兼容。该项目为四名研究生和三名博士后研究人员提供支持，还包括在一个少数人口大于50％的社区中为五至七年级的女孩建模研讨会。