Dan Andresen, Ph.D. Kansas State University dan@k-state.edu Donald F. (Rick) McMullen, Ph.D.

1. The CyberCommons: Cyberinfrastructure for Understanding and Forecasting Ecological Change in the Central Plains Grasslands Dan Andresen, Ph.D. Kansas State University dan@k-state.eduDonald F. (Rick) McMullen, Ph.D. University of Kansas mcmullend@ku.edu Great Plains Network Annual Meeting May 28, 2009 Kansas City, KS

2. Ecological Forecasting Research Modeling interaction of ecosystems, climate and land use Predicting the impact of climate change, human activity, changes in biodiversity, invasive species and disease on ecosystems Inherently multidisciplinary Developing and integrating science frameworks across many disciplines remains a big problem Cyberinfrastructure required to support all aspects of multidisciplinary ecological research

3. Ecological Forecasting Center Collaboratory to address a grand challenge of the 21st century • Crucial for sustainable inhabitation locally and globally • Intimately tied to local economy • Requires cross disciplinary approach, break down traditional barriers • Large amounts of existing data waiting to be synthesized • New approaches make analyses possible that never were before (e.g. GIS, statistics, computer models)

4. The problem Understand the biological and ecological consequences of global change • across natural and human systems • Wildlands, agrolands, exurban to urban • sense and analyze drivers and consequences • biotic, abiotic, and social • model and forecast complex environmental phenomena

5. Modeling focus: two areas • Ecosystem and biodiversity processes and functions • Future climate, water and land use/land cover

6. The Challenge Integrate science framework with cyber framework for ecological forecasting

7. Ecological Forecasting Center NG • Current EPSCoR project is ending • Next generation research infrastructure must meet these challenges: • Broader modeling efforts and more interdisciplinary research • Coupled models from several disciplines to develop and test theory and to improve predictive ability • CI is needed to support an extremely diverse set of activities

8. Meeting the challenge: The CyberCommons for Ecological research • NSF EPSCoR Track II: Cyberinfrastructure to enable research (pending) • A CyberCommons for Ecological Forecasting • Two states: KS, OK • Four universities: KU, KSU, OU, OSU • $6M (NSF) + $3M (match) • Science Framework • Data • Models • Analytics • Narratives • Cyber Framework • Hardware • Software • Collaboration Environment • Integration Environment

9. CyberCommons Infrastructure • Four primary sites: OU, OSU, KSU, KU • Distributed virtual data center • Sensor networks • Field Station and Ecological Reserves (KSR, KU) • Kessler Farm Field Laboratory (KFFL, OU) • Konza Prairie (KPBS, K-State) • Regional and national R&E networks • GPN, KanREN, ONENet • Internet2, NLR

10. Biogeochemistry, climate sensors Field Station and Ecological Reserves (KU) Flux towers, wireless networks Konza Prairie (K-State) Big/small animal collars, eco sensors, 2x bandwidth Kessler Farm Field Laboratory (OU) Soil reflectometer, wireless, moisture Plus storage…

11. Large Aperture Scintillometer to monitor CO2, H20, and energy fluxes Eddy Covariance towers to monitor environmental variations in the Kansas River watershed Infrastructure tools: biogeochemistry, climate

12. CyberCommons Conceptual Framework Cyber Framework Science Framework • Objective is to synthesize the science framework with the cyber framework • Forecast complex reciprocal impacts among primary • drivers: climate, land-use • consequences: biotic, biogeochemical and hydrological dynamics

13. Data: sensor measurements, satellite imagery, field surveys, vouchered biocollections Models: system models for climate change, LU/LC change, biogeochemistry, species niches, epidemiology Analytics: techniques and tools for exploring potential correlates and embedded patterns in complex, multidimensional data (data mining, scaling, mapping) Narratives: scenarios of change involving drivers and consequences across geospatial and temporal parameters. CyberCommons: Science Framework

14. Hardware: storage, computing, visualization components Software: software, middleware and data service components Collaboration Environment: social networking tools such as blogs, wikis, interest profiles, link libraries; shared bibliographies; video conferencing, on-line meeting tools and services Integration Environment: Web portals, grid services, mashups, etc. for integrating science components (data, models, analytics, narratives) Cyber Framework Cyber Framework

15. Cyberinfrastructure components Compute resources (servers, HPC, HTC) Storage (file systems, RDBMS and OODBMS, RDF triplestore) Sensor networks Authentication and authorization (Shib, entitlement servers) Service containers (Web services, Grid services, REST) Software as a Service (models, analytical procedures, data assimilation processes, workflows) User interfaces and end-user services (portals, collaboration services)

16. General Architecture The cyberCommons components (only a cyber person can decipher this)

17. Questions? Dan Andresen, Ph.D. Kansas State UniversityRick McMullen University of Kansas