Olson, R. J.; Briggs, J. M.; Porter, J. H.; Mah, G. R.; Stafford, S. G. 1999. Managing data from multiple disciplines, scales, and sites to support synthesis and modeling. Remote Sensing of Environment. 70(1): 99-107.
The synthesis and modeling of ecological processes atmultiple spatial and temporal scales involves bringing to-gether and sharing data from numerous sources. This ar-ticle describes a data and information system model thatfacilitates assembling, managing, and sharing diversedata from multiple disciplines, scales, and sites to supportintegrated ecological studies. Cross-site scientific-domainworking groups coordinate the development of data asso-ciated with their particular scientific working group, in-cluding decisions about data requirements, data to becompiled, data formats, derived data products, andschedules across the sites. The Web-based data and infor-mation system consists of nodes for each working groupplus a central node that provides data access, project in-formation, data query, and other functionality. The ap-proach incorporates scientists and computer experts inthe working groups and provides incentives for individu-als to submit documented data to the data and informa-tion system. Published by Elsevier Science Inc.