ITR Collaborative Research: Enabling the Science Environment for Ecological Knowledge (SEEK)

理解和维持21世纪的自然世界取决于提高我们获取生态、地球科学和人类维度数据的能力；挖掘这些数据以获取新知识；向决策者和公众传达新的见解。计算机科学和信息技术研究可以有效地解决其中许多问题，提高我们进行生态科学的能力。这项多学科的研究调查将创建“生态知识科学环境”(SEEK)--一种信息技术框架和基础设施，通过促进分布式生态信息的发现、获取、整合、解释和分析，用于派生和扩展生态知识。Seek将提供本地桌面数据与更大的数据和分析工具网络的集成，使生态学家和其他研究人员能够解决迄今难以解决的复杂研究问题。SEEK计划建立在NSF对生态和生物多样性信息学的大量和富有成效的投资的基础上，它将四个高度合作、具有前瞻性的机构聚集在一起，建立伙伴关系，致力于发明和支持环境生物学的全球计算基础设施。该项目涉及一个由来自生物多样性信息学伙伴关系(PBI)的计算机科学家、生态学家和技术人员组成的多学科团队，PBI是一个由国家生态分析与合成中心(NCEAS)、圣地亚哥超级计算机中心(SDSC)、这项为期五年的计划将从根本上改进研究人员如何1)获取全球数据和信息，2)快速定位和利用分布式计算服务，以及3)使用强大的新方法来捕获、复制和扩展分析过程本身。Seek还将通过台式计算机上运行的强大的数据发现和分析工具，专门为生态学家和其他研究人员提供访问信息资源和计算服务的大规模网络的机会。这些能力将显著地建设研究能力，以更有效地解决环境生物学中的全球研究、管理和政策问题，这些问题日益需要更高效、更自动化地访问分布式和异质数据。将采用多方面的方法来确保因寻求最佳利益而产生的研究产品、软件和信息技术基础设施造福科学、教育和公众。外联活动包括社区参与、WWW门户网站、信息学培训，以及创新的年度研讨会和培训计划，重点是向年轻研究人员和学生，特别是来自代表性不足群体的学生转让信息技术。在信息经济中，获取用于知识创造和决策的信息与信息本身一样有价值。该项目将使生物多样性和生态信息的知识内容成为科学和社会的通货。重大项目成果的例子包括：(I)通过Seek基础设施彻底发现、获取和整合生态、地球和人类层面的数据和信息；(Ii)开发智能分析工具和基础设施，以支持科学家、决策者和普通公众的需求；(Iii)对下一代生态学家进行信息技术技能教育和培训；(Iv)通过扩大获取生态数据、信息和知识的机会，增加科学家、资源管理者、决策者和公众作出关于环境的科学决策的机会。

Understanding and sustaining the natural world in the 21st century depends on improving our capacity to access ecological, earth science, and human-dimension data; mining these data for new knowledge; and conveying new insights to decision-makers and the general public. Computer science and information technology research can effectively address many of these issues and advance our ability to conduct ecological science. This multidisciplinary research investigation will create a "Science Environment for Ecological Knowledge" (SEEK)-an information technology framework and infrastructure that will be used to derive and extend ecological knowledge by facilitating the discovery, access, integration, interpretation, and analyses of distributed ecological information. SEEK will provide for the integration of local desktop data with a larger network of data and analytical tools, enabling ecologists and other researchers to tackle complex research problems that were hitherto intractable. The SEEK initiative stands on the foundation of substantial and productive NSF investment in ecological and biodiversity informatics and it brings together four highly collaborative, forward-looking institutions in a partnership committed to inventing and supporting a global computing infrastructure for environmental biology. The project involves a multidisciplinary team of computer scientists, ecologists and technologists from the Partnership for Biodiversity Informatics (PBI), a consortium comprising the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS); the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC); the University of Kansas (KU), and the University of New Mexico (UNM)) and partnering institutions (Arizona State University, University of North Carolina, University of Vermont, and Napier University in Scotland).This five-year initiative will lead to fundamental improvements in how researchers can 1) gain global access to data and information, 2) rapidly locate and utilize distributed computational services, and 3) exercise powerful new methods for capturing, reproducing, and extending the analysis process itself. SEEK will also specifically provide ecologists and other researchers access to a large-scale network of information resources and computational services, via powerful data discovery and analysis tools that operate from desktop computers. These capabilities will significantly build research capacity to more effectively address global research, management and policy issues in environmental biology that increasingly require much more efficient, automated access to distributed and heterogeneous data.A multi-faceted approach will be employed to insure that the research products, software, and information technology infrastructure resulting from SEEK optimally benefit science, education, and the public. Outreach includes community involvement, a WWW portal, informatics training, and an innovative annual symposium and training program that focuses on information technology transfer to young investigators and students, particularly those from underrepresented groups. In the information economy, access to information for knowledge creation and decision-making is as valuable as the information itself. This project will enable bringing the intellectual content of biodiversity and ecological information into currency for science and society. Examples of significant project outcomes include: (i) revolutionizing discovery, access to and integration of ecological, earth, and human dimension data and information through the SEEK infrastructure; (ii) developing intelligent analytical tools and infrastructure to support the needs of scientists, decision-makers, and the general public; (iii) education and training of the next generation of ecologists in information technology skills; and (iv) improving the opportunities for scientists, resource managers, policy makers, and the public to make scientifically-informed decisions about the environment by expanding access to ecological data, information, and knowledge.