Submit your abstract to the One Geology session in the 34th IGC 2012!

Dear OneGeology colleagues,

Please remember to submit your OneGeology abstracts by 17th February.
The OneGeology sessions are within Theme 5 as follows:

5.1 Geoscience Spatial Data Infrastructure
Robert Tomas (robert.tomas@jrc.ec.europa.eu), Bruce Simons (Bruce.Simons@dpi.vic.gov.au)

Symposium for regional geoscience information activities and developments from Oceania, Africa, Asia, Europe and the Americas. The latest news from geoscience-related Spatial Data Infrastructure development around the world, with particular reference to the pan-European INSPIRE initiative and SDI, the North American GIN and Geoconnections initiatives and the Australian AuScope project


5.2. Information Management - Interoperability and Standards
John Laxton (jll@bgs.ac.uk), Simon Cox (Simon.cox@csiro.au)

Geoscience information management best practise and standards for digital and analogue data; thesauri, dictionaries, vocabularies, ontologies and semantics. Development and application of information exchange formats underpinning interoperability (GeoSciML, GML, EarthResourceML, OGC and other standards), mapping data models to standards; successes, best practise and lessons learnt.

5.3. Delivery, dissemination and exploitation of geoscience data and information
Richard Hughes (rah@bgs.ac.uk), Oliver Raymond (Oliver.Raymond@ga.gov.au)

Strategic and technical progress, developments and plans from the OneGeology Global and OneGeology Europe initiatives. The creation of information and knowledge from geoscience data to address societal needs and create societal impacts and benefits; intellectual property and digital rights management in the digital era. Developments and best practise in the delivery of dynamic and static data and information.

Download the full details in the brochure for Theme 5 at http://www.34igc.org/FileLibrary/brochure_igc34_theme5_20jan.pdf

Best regards
OneGeology secretariat

IGC-YES Symposium 2012 in Brisbane, Australia

Dear YES member,

We invite you to submit an abstract to the IGC YES Symposium ‘Overcoming geoscience challenges in the 21st century by developing and improving the skills of early-career geoscientists’ (Theme 36, symposium 36.7).

You should note that this symposium is a part of the main IGC program and therefore abstract submission for this symposium will be governed by the same ‘rules’ as other IGC abstracts.
This means that:
- Abstracts must be submitted via the IGC abstract portal (http://www.34igc.org/submit-abstracts.php; this involves a cost)
- Presenters may only give one oral presentation; they can however have both a talk and a poster (separate abstracts need to be submitted for each)
- Abstracts are due by 17 February 2012 (AUSTRALIAN TIME)
- Abstracts must be submitted using the correct template or they may be rejected outright

We recommended that you don’t leave your abstract submission until the last minute as many people do that and the servers can get overloaded preventing upload.

Finally, if you do have any problems submitting your abstract please contact the conference organisers (email provided) NOT the YES President.

Regards,

YES Communications Support Team

Earth Science Week 2012 Theme Announced: Discovering Careers in the Earth Sciences

The American Geosciences Institute (AGI) is pleased to announce that the theme of Earth Science Week 2012 will be "Discovering Careers in the Earth Sciences." This year's event will boost awareness about the geosciences and the many exciting career and job opportunities in the field.

Earth Science Week 2012 materials and activities will engage young people and others in learning how geoscientists gather and interpret data about the Earth and other planets. Through careers in geology, geophysics, oceanography, hydrology, paleontology, Earth science education, and many other fields, they enhance our understanding of Earth processes and improve the quality of human life.

"With this year's focus on jobs, Earth Science Week provides a great chance for teachers and guidance counselors to spread the word to students and parents about geoscience careers," says Ann Benbow, AGI's Director of Education and Outreach. "With over 150,000 positions expected to open in the next decade, opportunities for building an exciting and meaningful career in the geosciences have never been better, even in this tough economy," says Christopher M. Keane, head of AGI's Geoscience Workforce Program.

AGI leads Earth Science Week annually in cooperation with its sponsors and the geoscience community as a service to the public. Each year, community groups, educators, and interested citizens organize celebratory events. Earth Science Week offers the public opportunities to discover the Earth sciences and engage in responsible stewardship of the Earth. Earth Science Week is supported by the U.S. Geological Survey, the AAPG Foundation, NASA, the National Park Service, ExxonMobil, and Esri.

Earth Science Week 2012 will be celebrated October 14-20. For more about this week and ways to get involved -- including newsletters, local events, and classroom activities -- please see the Earth Science Week web site at http://www.earthsciweek.org/.

AGI and AIPG Team Up to Launch the Geoscience Online Learning Initiative (GOLI)

The American Geosciences Institute (AGI) and the American Institute of Professional Geologists (AIPG) have teamed up to launch the Geoscience Online Learning Initiative (GOLI).

This joint effort seeks to build a portfolio of online learning opportunities to help support the professional development of prospective and early-career geoscientists as well as addressing topics of interest to the broader geoscience profession. GOLI courses will support both synchronous and asynchronous online learning, and count toward continuing education units (CEU's).

AGI and AIPG are pleased to announce the first three webinar events of GOLI. Details of the webinars are available at: http://www.aipg.org/e-mail/GOLI.html.

The topics, times, and presenters are:

Global Energy Resources: Current Trends and Short Term Predictions. January 18, 2012, 2:00 pm EST. Presented by Ronald J. Wallace, President-Elect, AIPG

Critical and Strategic Minerals: Concepts and Status. February 1, 2012, 2:00 pm EST. Presented by Jim Burnell, Colorado Geological Survey

Effective Power Point Presentations. February 22, 2012, 2:00 pm EST. Presented by Chris Mathewson, Texas A&M University

The American Institute of Professional Geologists (AIPG) was founded in 1963 to certify the credentials of practicing geologists and to advocate on behalf of the profession. AIPG represents the professional interests of all practicing

geoscientists in every discipline. Its advocacy efforts are focused on the promotion of the role of geology and geologists in society.

The OneGeology Best Application Competition

OneGeology Operational Management Group announces an opportunity to innovate the OneGeology Best Application Competition'

Aim: The main aim of the OneGeology Best Application competition is to demonstrate the wide range of potential applied uses and applications that the OneGeology Portal, and geological data/services that it provides, can offer for easy discoverability, access and use.

Possible types of OneGeology Applications :

Developed OneGeology applications can demonstrate:

1- A new innovative web application of geological data, to address any environmental, social etc. issues. The combination - integration of geological data with other types of environmental data is of prime interest.

2- A new innovative technical solution of the geological application e.g. on-line incorporation of OneGeology geological web services (WMS, WFS) into a client application or a new way to discover / 3- search geological data etc.

A new solution for making progress in the direction of semantic harmonization – e.g. utilizing the OneGeology web services (WMS, WFS) for on-line geometric-semantic harmonization across administrative boundaries.

Who can apply:

The competition is aimed at the young geoscientists especially those within the YES (Young Earth Scientist) Network; so the competition is open to all young geoscientists (under 35 years of age). The OneGeology development team encourages students, or any young researchers to develop an innovative application based on the geological data and services provided via OneGeology Portal.

The winning prize:

The winner of the competition will receive a free registration for the 34th International Geological Congress, Brisbane, Australia (August 2012) and will also have the opportunity to present the new innovative application during the Geoinformation Symposium/ OneGeology Session at the conference.

For more details about how to register and selection procedures, visit the following link: http://www.onegeology.org/igc34/competition.html

Deadline: 30 May 2012

Lessons to learn from 2011 earthquakes

Natural hazards, such as earthquakes, tsunamis, volcanic eruptions, and global climate-change pose unremitting threats to our young, 10,000-year-old, civilization. There are ample evidences to map a complete profile of vulnerabilities, which we have been facing in the past. The devastations of Acehnese and Thai coasts in 2004, of Kashmir and New Orleans in 2005, of southwest Java in 2006, of Sumatra again in 2007, western Sichuan and Myanmar in 2008, of Haiti in 2010 and of Japan in 2011, comprise an unremitting event of death and destruction.

In some of these events the warning signs were known to exist; for example, New Orleans and Port au Prince, which had long been recognised as a catastrophe waiting to happen, but somehow even that awareness has had no effect! Similarly, there are several places in the world, for example SE Asia, where the knowledge about earthquakes is still in its infancy. This has caused colossal loss to life and property. For example in Kashmir and Aceh, these tragic examples, in which basic scientific ignorance and the inability to translate the acquired knowledge into timely planned action clearly shows the challenges earth science faces today.

The recent earthquake in Japan and the tsunami that followed it, once again highlighted and simultaneously warned us about our ignorance in understanding the dynamic earth processes. Though, there were fewer casualties, but, the scientific information about the earthquake potential and its associated hazards were grossly ignored or simply not put into an effective action plan. Japan is probably the only country with a sophisticated earthquake instrumentation, knowledge and preparedness to tackle these hazards; however, the bitter truth remains that they have failed to warn people about events of such magnitude, that many said was a surprise, but, in reality, this had been forecasted by many scientists. It therefore, gives us an opportunity to review the status of earthquake research in all countries, which are at the verge of earthquake disasters.

Before the awareness about a possible threat, which can be posed by tsunamis dawned on people at large, especially in the wake of a number of recent tsunamis, there was almost no concern to map underwater faults, potentially because we were ignorant of the consequences it can have. However, the need was revived and Japan, by now has 50 observatories offshore to understand the sea-floor faults. This number is extremely less, compared to 8,700 on land. But, many nations have none or a few such stations to map deadly faults, mostly on sea-floor. It is therefore, imperative to map active faults on ocean floor and deploy the geophysical instruments to measure the deformation as accurately as possible. This is crucial for our safety and welfare, which should be our priority.

It may take several decades to understand/predict the complicated tectonics associated with earthquakes, before we can successfully warn people in advance. However, the effects can be minimized by educating societies. This practice has played a huge role in saving lives, for example in Japan. There are reports, where a principle of a school, demolished a wall to allow the students to freely run to higher altitudes, before the arrival of a tsunami. All those people were subsequently saved. However, there are also cases where people went to the protective tsunami wall to see its arrival, thereby, ignoring its dangerous impact. This happens because people were NOT told in advance that the tsunami waves can reach enormous heights.

One thing however is clear; which is that dangers and hazards associated with a tsunami or an earthquake can be much bigger than what we anticipate and therefore prior preparations should be made for the same.

 

Afroz Ahmad Shah

ACCESS Student Recruitment Call

ACCESS a new national community of students and supervisors, all working in different scientific fields in our unique and globally recognised natural laboratory for the study of Earth Systems. ACCESS is recruiting post-graduate students (honours, masters and doctoral) from several disciplines of natural and physical science to join its exciting initiative!
ACCESS is a multi-institutional and multi-disciplinary programme, partnering with various South African universities and key research agencies. As an NRF Centre of Excellence, ACCESS, together with its partners, aims to deliver a new scale of intervention in Earth Systems Science in southern Africa within the scope of the Department of Science and Technology’s Global Change Grand Challenge.
- Eligibility criteria:
Applicants who have a research interest within or related to one of the following disciplines are invited to apply:
• Earth Systems Modelling and Biochemical Cycles
• Seasonal/Inter-annual Climate Predictability
• Water Resources Dynamics
• Urban and Rural Land Cover and Land Use
• Ecosystem Services and Livelihoods
• Long-term Climate and Impacts
• Marine and Coastal, Estuarine Systems.


- Application deadline
All applications for 2012 must be submitted for consideration before 28 November 2011


For more information, download the brochure of the call.