ADAPTATION & USE OF OPENGIS © WEB TECHNOLOGIES FOR MULTI-DISCIPLINARY ACCESS TO PLANETARY DATA

We are adapting the fast developing and well-supported OpenGIS * standards and technologies for the access, processing, and display of geo-spatial data to the planetary domain. In particular, we are implementing WMS and WCS servers to present high level products derived from NASA’s Mars and Lunar datasets to produce scientific composites of our knowledge of the planet. The specific information technologies used for this work are the existing OpenGIS methodologies for Earth data; we are extending and generalizing these standards for the planetary case. The basic motivation is that investigators need a unified methodology for accessing higher-level products that serve as substrate, background, and current known detail pertinent to their ongoing work. The goal and promise is that, when ultimately placed in operation at the relevant data archival sites, the data can continue to be archived at these distributed sites, while affording the user a single point of access, and, that specialized access points (clients in OGC parlance) can be built by anyone. The nature of our work will lead to the broad publication of global multi-phenomenological maps of lunar and planetary bodies. These maps will be hierarchical and afford both synoptic and high-resolution views of each body published. The multiple views will make clear what differences exist, and, because they present the different phenomena as a composite, this capability should provide a basis to better understand planetary processes