Exploratory visualization of earth science data in a Semantic Web context

Xiaogang Ma

While earth science data are increasingly being shared online, we currently face a shortage of tools and services that support information and knowledge discovery with such online data. Moreover, users of these data are not only geoscientists but also the average citizen. We aim to chain up Semantic Web technologies, data visualization and online earth science data to develop exploratory functions for information and knowledge discovery. Expected outputs of this study include: (1) Updated interactive functions between ontologies, visualizations and online geological map services based on our previous work; (2) A prototype of an enhanced online geological map service portal by using ontologies and visualizations; and (3) Theoretical discussion on how to use visualization to lower the barrier of ontology applications and online geological maps to average citizen.