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MSP offshore data management and IT

Introduction

ECORD Science Operator Data Man­age­ment for Mis­sion Spe­cific Plat­form (MSP) ex­ped­i­tions has the following main objectives:

  • systematic capture and storage of data and metadata during all expedition phases (s. below), using documented and standardized procedures
  • quality control in order to ensure dataset integrity
  • enabling access to MSP expedition data, initially only for the expedition’s Science Party only (moratorium period), later also for the entire scientific community
  • long-term archiving of MSP expedition data adding to the legacy of IODP

For Mis­sion Spe­cific Plat­form (MSP) ex­ped­i­tions, the data man­age­ment pro­cess can be di­vided into three phases.

The Offshore Phase lasts for the dur­a­tion of the off­shore drilling op­er­a­tion. Due to the lim­ited fa­cil­it­ies on­board mis­sion spe­cific plat­forms, only time-sensitive sci­entific data or data that has a decisive influence on the drilling process are gen­er­ated in addition to the basic curatorial data. Data types in­clude curatorial metadata on sites, holes, cores, sections and samples, core-catcher pho­to­graphs, ini­tial li­tho­lo­gical de­scrip­tions and meas­ure­ments, multi-sensor core logs, eph­em­eral prop­er­ties, mi­cro­bi­o­lo­gical ob­ser­va­tions, down­hole logs, drilling para­met­ers and ex­ped­i­tion doc­u­ment­a­tion.

The Onshore Phase be­gins when the offshore drilling op­er­a­tion is com­pleted and lasts un­til the end of the morator­ium period. On com­ple­tion of the Off­shore Phase all data from the offshore server are trans­ferred to the Bre­men Core Re­pos­it­ory and are avail­able to ex­ped­i­tion sci­ent­ists via pass­word-pro­tec­ted data portals. It is dur­ing this phase that the bulk of the sci­entific data and in­ter­pret­a­tions are gen­er­ated, es­pe­cially dur­ing the On­shore Sci­ence Party (OSP) in Bre­men. Ex­amples of ad­di­tional data types gen­er­ated dur­ing this phase are detailed visual core de­scrip­tions of the split cores, high res­ol­u­tion line-scans and core over­view im­ages, meas­ure­ments of various physical and chemical properties as well as strati­graphic data.

The Post-expedition Phase be­gins at the end of the morator­ium period. In this phase the data man­age­ment pro­cess changes from the cap­ture of ex­ped­i­tion data to archiv­ing of the data, and pro­vi­sion of the data to the sci­entific com­munity. This is when the ex­ped­i­tion data are trans­ferred to PANGAEA - Data Publisher for Earth & Environmental Sciences. The down­hole log data are trans­ferred to the LDEO IODP Log Database. Curatorial metadata are also ex­por­ted and incorporated into the BCR curatorial mDIS (mobile Drilling Information System), which is the primary long-term sample management system for all IODP MSP expeditions as well as all IODP cores stored in the BCR.

During Offshore and Onshore phase storage of MSP expedition data consists of two components:

  • Expedition Science Folder: a shared folder storage for all documents, analytical results and further files produced until the end of the moratorium by the expedition's science party;
  • Expedition mDIS: expedition specific Drilling Information System capturing curatorial metadata, as well as selected measurement outputs.
Generalized MSP Expedition Data Flow
Components of MSP expedition data storage and generalized data flow after end of moratorium.

 

 

 

 

Offshore database container during X381
Offshore database container during Exp. 381 (Corinth Active Rift Development). Photo credit: [Bitte aktivieren Sie Javascript]_IODP.

 

 

X381 offshore server
Offshore server cabinet during Exp. 381 (Corinth Active Rift Development). Photo credit: [Bitte aktivieren Sie Javascript]_IODP.

 

 

Data capture offshore I
Data capture offshore II
Data capture offshore during Exp. 389 (Hawaiian Drowned Reefs). Both Photo credit: [Bitte aktivieren Sie Javascript]_IODP