Research collaboration, hazard modeling and dissemination in volcanology with Vhub
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Abstract
Vhub (online at vhub.org) is a cyberinfrastructure for collaboration in volcanology research, education, and outreach. One of the core objectives of this project is to accelerate the transfer of research tools to organizations and stakeholders charged with volcano hazard and risk mitigation (such as observatories). Vhub offers a clearinghouse for computational models of volcanic processes and data analysis, documentation of those models, and capabilities for online collaborative groups focused on issues such as code development, configuration management, benchmarking, and validation. A subset of simulations is already available for online execution, eliminating the need to download and compile locally. In addition, Vhub is a platform for sharing presentations and other educational material in a variety of media formats, which are useful in teaching university-level volcanology. VHub also has wikis, blogs and group functions around specific topics to encourage collaboration and discussion.
In this presentation we provide examples of the vhub capabilities, including: (1) tephra dispersion and block-and-ash flow models; (2) shared educational materials; (3) online collaborative environment for different types of research, including field-based studies and plume dispersal modeling; (4) workshops. Future goals include implementation of middleware to allow access to data and databases that are stored and maintained at various institutions around the world. All of these capabilities can be exercised with a user-defined level of privacy, ranging from completely private (only shared and visible to specified people) to completely public. The volcanological community is encouraged to use the resources of vhub and also to contribute models, datasets, and other items that authors would like to disseminate.
The project is funded by the US National Science Foundation and includes a core development team at University at Buffalo, Michigan Technological University, and University of South Florida, along with a group of collaborators from the international community. The VHub servers reside at Purdue University and the basic software infrastructure (see hubzero.org) is also maintained there.
This is a poster presented at AGU Fall Meeting 2011
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