The GEOportal is one of the three candidates developed in response to a set of requirements from the GEO Secretariat aiming at the implementation of a GEO Web Portal serving the GEO User Community.

As part of the Initial Operational Capability of GEOSS, the GEOportal constitutes a main access point to worldwide information on Earth Observation capabilities and services including the ones proposed and implemented in the framework of GEO activities. The GEOportal includes a number of common functions and solutions to search and discover services and provides news and other relevant information to the GEOSS user community. The Community concept is extended to a global community and across all GEOSS users providing an entry point to the resources no matter where the user is located and no matter the nature of usage within the GEOSS areas of application. The portal achieves this goal based on two key characteristics:

• A high-level structure of the information according to the nine GEO Societal Benefit Areas (SBAs).
• A global coverage, linking all resources contributed by the GEO members and participating organizations.

GEOportal complements the already existing Community Portals and other Portals operated by GEO Members and Participating Organizations and as such, unlike most other GEOSS components, it does not belong to any single member or organization.

Based on the GEO recommended standards and following the Geospatial Portal Reference Architecture of the Open Geospatial Consortium,the GEOportal provides a variety of services:
- Geospatial Portal Service providing the user interfaces for viewing, discovering data, information and services available in GEOSS.
- Portrayal Viewer Service allowing the display and handling of maps and context information from various sources, e.g. from different GEO Societal Benefit Areas through WMS services.
- Interfaces to Catalogue Services of the GEOSS Clearinghouse, allowing distributed catalogue search in an interoperable manner.
- Browse through a comprehensive directory of service providers e.g. related to GEO Members and Participating Organizations.
- Retrieval of Earth observation education, training and capacity building resources.

GEOportal homepage

Through a user friendly interface the homepage allows quick access to a variety of information resources. When a relevant event happens somewhere in the world, an SBA alert appears on the globe, localized over the region related to the event. For example real time alerts and activations of the International Charter “Space and Major Disasters” are already appearing on the rotating globe on the GEOportal homepage.

From the homepage, to access to different types of information, the GEOportal allows navigation and access primary via Societal Benefit Area selection and Geographical selection. The SBA selection leads the user to a main SBA page providing relevant information on the services available within that SBA, the service providers, the international initiatives in place, as well as showcases of data sets. From there, the user can have access to specific service pages, providing, among other, a user friendly description of the services, a point of contact and a direct link to the services. A system of related resources builds a knowledge system able to provide the user with a wider variety of information on services and organizations operating in its area of interest. The user can also refine his search by SBA subcategory and/or geographical area, in order to retrieve services more appropriate to satisfy his informational needs. The geographical selection allows the user, selecting regions and countries from the rotating globe, to access a variety of data, information resources and services available for that specific geographical area. The search can be refined as well by the SBA of interest.

At the time of writing, several GEO Member States and Participating Organizations have established implementation pilots and made available Community Portals accessible from the GEOportal. These community portals are serving particular regions and/or are specific to a Societal Benefit Area of GEOSS and related user scenarios.

In perspective, the GEOportal may also be used for creating Community Portals or individual portals if required by a GEO member or participating organization. The GEOportal software is based on a number of Open Source modules which could be made available and configured to create for example a Portal for a specific SBA. The GEOportal open source software may be taken up by GEOSS communities to create their own portals, lowering the entry barrier, in particular for developing countries, to become part of the GEOSS and contributing to the establishment of an interoperable GEOSS.

With the number of components of GEOSS growing, it is fundamental to ensure that any resource newly available to GEOSS can be discovered through the GEOportal coupled to the GEOSS Clearinghouse and GEOSS Registries. ESA has secured the operations of the portal until the end of 2009 as a minimum and accordingly to ESA standard service levels.

The GEOportal operations are not actually limited to the operations of the technical infrastructure of the underlying GEOportal system, but include the maintenance of the information contained locally within the GEOportal and ensure the consistency of the links and interfaces to GEOSS. Local information may include up to date sample data sets representative of the different SBAs and the GEOportal provides also value-adding in that its operators proactively identify and highlight specific data and information.

The need for additional features/evolutions will be assessed during the Initial Operational Capability of GEOSS taking into account the operational experience of the GEOportal and users’ feedback. The GEOportal is now open to serve GEOSS the global community.

The GEOportal is actually operational and is available at the URL: www.geoportal.org.

Editor’s note: FAO is the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations

The 2007-2008 International Polar Year (IPY) provides an international framework for improving our understanding of high-latitude climate change and enhancing our skill in predicting world-wide impacts. Recent, well documented observations of the dramatically changing high-latitude components of earth’s cryosphere (e.g., those areas where water is frozen either seasonally or permanently) make IPY science investigations particularly timely and relevant to scientists, policy makers and the general public. Effective IPY investigations require a range of commitments of resources: from providing support to individual field activities, to those which require the international coordination of complex systems and their operations. During IPY, to date considerable progress is being made towards characterization of key high-latitude processes by means of spaceborne snapshots of the polar regions. A number of ongoing efforts are described below which are designed to coordinate these satellite acquisitions, to help demonstrate the benefits of a cryospheric observing system component, and to develop IPY data legacy comprising critical climate benchmarks.

The Global Interagency IPY Polar Snapshot Year

Figure 2. Composite meteorological satellite image products from GOES, Meteosat, DMSP, AVHRR, produced routinely at different spatial resolutions and at regular intervals of 3 hours (Courtesy U. Wisconsin-Madison and ESA Polar View Consortium)

The Global Interagency IPY Polar Snapshot Year (GIIPSY) is a World Meteorological Organization (WMO)/International Council for Science (ICSU) approved IPY Project whose objective is to obtain high-resolution, broad spectral snapshots of the polar regions during 2007-2008 (Figure 1). Our primary purpose is to use these snapshots as gauges for comparing past and future environmental changes in the polar ice, ocean, and land. In the spirit of IPY, we also seek to secure these data sets as our legacy to the next generations of polar scientists.

GIIPSY comprises polar scientists from around the world who have assembled a consolidated list of thematic objectives (Table 1) that call upon the collective resources of international space agencies. Our programmatic goal is to identify ways in which the resources of space-faring countries can be used in such a way as to collect data with which to address these scientific objectives, without putting undo burden on any single organisation. To that end, we seek cooperation in terms of spaceborne instruments, data relay systems, ground segments, processing, and data archiving and distribution capabilities.

A general description of the GIIPSY programme and its current status and progress can be found on-line at http://bprc.osu.edu/rsl/GIIPSY. Detailed scientific driving requirements and objectives for the satellite observations were derived from pre-IPY town hall meetings (e.g. AGU December 2006), discussions with other science planning groups including IGOS (Goodison, 2007, IGOS, 2007), and wide-ranging debate within the GIIPSY science community. The complete set of requirements are documented in Table 1 and in subsequent publications and presentations (Jezek and Drinkwater, 2006, Jezek and Drinkwater, 2007, Farness, Jezek and Drinkwater, 2007). Together, we have taken the detailed science requirements and distilled them into a set of thematic objectives, which are listed in Table 1. Topics range from permafrost to sea ice and include several objectives that would be the first of their kind.

Figure 3. Polar data which are routinely acquired by polar orbiting satellite imaging instruments are composited from a number of orbital passes each day to provide complete coverage of the polar regions. Overlapping pairs of swaths from AVHRR on METOP (courtesy NOAA and Eumetsat), are used here to track cloud motions and to derive high altitude winds for assimilation into numerical weather prediction models.

In order to fulfil the scientific objectives described above, carefully coordinated data acquisitions over both the northern and southern hemisphere are required using the broad range of available satellite instrument capabilities. This is best achieved using polar-orbiting satellites that routinely acquire image or other instrument data over the high-latitude regions along approximately 14 crossing orbits each day.

Operational meteorological satellites equipped with the AVHRR optical imager such as NOAA-15 and MetOp acquire data which are routinely composited to provide complete polar coverage at intervals of up to a few hours (see Figure 2). Such overlapping images acquired by meteorological satellites are used to track large-scale cloud motion (Figure 3) when the surface is cloud-covered. Meanwhile, other higher resolution satellite optical instruments may be used to capture ice sheet movement (Figure 4) in instances when the surface is not obscured by clouds. Optical data are complemented by all-weather, day or night data acquired using satellite microwave radar or radiometers. Figure 5 indicates an entire Arctic mosaic and regional details of sea-ice conditions using microwave synthetic aperture radar (SAR) image data, whilst Figure 6 shows how pairs of high resolution SAR may be used interferometrically, to reveal streaming ice flow in Antarctica.

Figure 7 shows how the products derived from multi-satellite, multi-frequency satellite data may be plotted on a virtual Earth to fully capture the state of various elements of the cryosphere. Many such products are now routinely available in Google for convenient viewing of current status of the entire polar region.

Space Task Group

Interaction between GIIPSY and the international space agencies is coordinated through the IPY Space Task Group (STG), which is convened by the WMO. A number of meetings have taken place between the following Space Agency members and participating organisations: China Meteorological Administration (CMA), the Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales (CNES), the Canadian Space Agency (CSA), the German Aerospace Center (DLR), the European Space Agency (ESA), the European Organisation for the Exploitation of Meteorological Satellites (EUMETSAT), the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the Russian Federal Service for Hydrometeorology and Environmental Monitoring (ROSHYDROMET), the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP), and WMO. Meanwhile, we have approached several other agencies about joining the federated efforts of the STG, including Agenzie Spaziale Italiana (ASI), the Instituto Nacional de Pesquisas Espaciais (INPE), the Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO), the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA), and the U.S. Geological Service (USGS).

Figure 4. (left) SPOT HRS image acquired on 24 July, 2007 and (right) velocity map (m/year) at the calving front of Jakobshavn Isbræ, Greenland. Velocities were derived from feature tracking over 11 days interval between the above image and one acquired later on 04 August 2007. The 10 km/y and 13 km/y contour lines are shown with thin black contours. The colours indicate high velocities which exceed 12000m/yr, and up to a maximum value of 15500 m/yr, or the equivalent of 42.5 m/day (Images ã CNES 2007; Distribution Spot Image).

The STG has agreed upon three important programmatic activities. First, the STG adopted the GIIPSY science requirements for guiding agency data acquisition planning. Second, the agencies are populating individual IPY “data portfolios”. Individual portfolios represent best efforts given agency resources and strategic mandates, but in total the goal is to fulfil them. By collaborating, the combined portfolios will represent a more complete response to the GIIPSY requirements. Most recently, the Space agencies have agreed to try to develop a coordinated acquisition strategy for high data rate instruments. The idea is to distribute the image acquisition burden across several agencies.

Current progress towards achieving a data legacy is identified in the form of the portfolio contents already assembled on the GIIPSY web site. Image examples acquired during 2007 which are shown here, illustrate the broad range of products that will constitute the IPY data legacy.

The Cryosphere Component of GEOSS

Leading up to the IPY, one of the key near-term goals of the World Climate Research Programme’s Climate and Cryosphere (CliC) Project has been to develop an Integrated Global Observing Strategy Theme on Cryosphere known as IGOS-Cryo (IGOS, 2007). The ongoing Polar Year provides a unique chance to illustrate the benefits of coordinated observations by a range of polar observing systems, comprising in-situ, airborne, or satellite-borne measurement capabilities. CliC together with the Scientific Committee on Antarctic Research (SCAR) are developing a conceptual framework and vision for a sustained Cryosphere Observing System, known as CryOS. The initial phase of development of CryOS coincides with IPY.

Figure 5. (above) SAR mosaic illustration of historical minimum in Arctic ice conditions, observed in September 2007 by Envisat ASAR (courtesy ã ESA). The coloured lines indicate the navigable routes of the North-west passage (orange), and North-east passage (blue). The red box inset (region shown below) inset shows new ice conditions one month later on 24th October during ice freeze up in the Prudhoe Bay region, Alaska, from TerraSAR-X (courtesy ã DLR).

IPY has facilitated the establishment of a Cryospheric system of systems which embodies the vision of the Global Earth Observing System of Systems (GEOSS). In this context, GIIPSY makes a vital contribution to CryOS by addressing the challenge of the inter-agency planning and coordination of observing infrastructure which is required to deliver a critical high-latitude element of the observing system.

Conclusion

The recent pace of changes observed in the polar regions has stimulated global interest in the International Polar Year. It is also exactly 50 years since the technical triumph of Sputnik and the International Geophysical Year. The confluence of international science programs, technical capabilities in satellite remote sensing, and IPY therefore present an extremely valuable opportunity for gathering data essential to understanding the changing polar climate and its global impact.

IPY uniquely federates scientific activities across 63 nations while the IPY Space Task Group and the GIIPSY IPY Project are actively harnessing the technical capabilities of the world’s Space Agencies and the specialist knowledge of their science communities to obtain a unique legacy data suite- or ‘polar snapshot’, comprising a broad range of satellite products. This data legacy will provide the opportunity to engage a new generation of researchers, experts, educators, policy makers, and polar residents in understanding the polar regions and changes in its environment, as well as the global consequences of these changes.

Background Reading

2007 Jezek, K.C., K. Farness, and M. Drinkwater. Global Interagency IPY Polar Snapshot Year: Goals and Accomplishments. Geophysical Research Abstracts, Vol 9. 01444, EGU, Vienna.
2007 Jezek, K.C. and M. Drinkwater. Global Interagency International Polar Year Polar Snapshot Year (GIIPSY). ASF News and Notes, Summer 2007, Vol 4:2, p. 2-3.
2006 Jezek, K.C., and M. Drinkwater Global Interagency IPY Polar Snapshot Year, EOS, Vol 87, Issue 50, p. 566.
2007 Goodison, B., J. Brown, K. Jezek, J Key, T. Prowse, A. Snorrason, and T. Worby. State and fate of the polar cryosphere, including variability of the Arctic hydrologic cycle. WMO Bulletin, vol. 56(4), p. 284-292.
2007 IGOS, Integrated Global Observing Strategy Cryosphere Theme Report – For the Monitoring of our Environment from Space and from Earth. Geneva: World Meteorological Organization. WMO/TD-No. 1405. 100 pp.

Figure 6. Illustration of mapping of Lambert Glacier streaming ice flow in Antarctica from Envisat ASAR, and ALOS PALSAR (inset) indicating details of flow from high resolution imagery in red box (Courtesy E.Rignot, JPL; and images ã ESA, 2007 and ã JAXA, 2007).

Figure 7. GIIPSY efforts during IPY offer the potential to illustrate the benefits that may accrue from establishment of sustained, routine coordinated observations of the polar regions. This MODIS satellite picture of snow cover, sea-ice temperature, glaciers and ice sheets illustrates the diversity of the terrestrial and ocean elements of the cryosphere which need to be captured by CryOS. (Courtesy of NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio)

This article has been prepared on behalf of the IPY Space Task Group, whose fundamental contributions are acknowledged in this endeavour. Without the contributions of these Space Agencies and other organisations, this effort would not be possible.

Further details about Agency portfolios and access to data products may be obtained at the Global Interagency IPY Polar Snapshot web site.

By Mark R. Drinkwater¹ and Ken Jezek²
1 – European Space Agency, Earth Observation Programmes, Mission Science Division. Email: mark.drinkwater@esa.int
2 – Byrd Polar Research Center, Ohio State University

The UK Polar Network

The UK Polar Network (UKPN) is an organisation of young British scientists, who either research or have strong interests in the polar regions. They come from organisations across the United Kingdom, ranging in age from undergraduates to PhD students and post-doctoral researchers. The UK Polar Network does not exist alone; it is the British branch of the Association of Polar Early-Career Scientists (APECS), itself recently established as part of the International Polar Year (IPY). The aim of APECS and its subsidiary organisations like the UK Polar Network is to outlive IPY, and leave a legacy of international co-operation and friendship that future young scientists can benefit from.

James Cheshire, a geography undergraduate at Southampton University, set up the UK Polar Network in early 2007. Cheshire first became interested in glaciers when he visited Iceland with his secondary school. Since then, Cheshire’s enthusiasm for cold regions has grown, fuelled by spending two months on the Juneau Icefield in Alaska this past summer.

It was during preparations for this trip that Cheshire decided he wanted to do more to promote the issues surrounding glaciated regions and looked to IPY for support. He discovered a lack of organizations, particularly relating to the polar regions, that provide opportunities for networking between early-career scientists or for these scientists to share their enthusiasm for their subjects with a wider audience, by getting involved in education and outreach. This motivated Cheshire to found the UKPN, which has quickly grown in size to boast an organizing committee of 13 people, and a membership of over 140 early-career scientists.

James Cheshire conducting research on the Juneau Icefield, Alaska. (Photo Courtesy James Cheshire, Southampton Univ.)

Creating links between young researchers

The young scientists that make up the UK Polar Network feel that it is important to create links between scientists across the spectrum of polar sciences. Science is multi-disciplinary and our network days show how important making these links is. A climatologist may predict a warming of the polar regions in coming decades, glaciologists look at how this affects the stability of the Greenland ice sheet and social scientists look at the challenges faced by the people who call these regions home to adapt whilst zoologists might study the response of the local wildlife.

It is important to provide opportunities for these scientists to network and share their research and ideas as well as learn about research in what they might have considered an unrelated field, the results of which could be relevant to their own studies. At the first UK Polar Network day held at the British Antarctic Survey in Cambridge in June, over 90 young scientists, including social scientists from around the country attended a day of talks by both young and more established scientists, saw footage of Antarctic expeditions from the BAS archive and exhibited their own research during a poster session.

UK Polar Network Day at the British Antarctic Survey. (Photo Courtesy Narelle Baker, Scott Polar Research Institute, Cambridge)

The UK Polar Network is also helping to organise a career development workshop immediately before the joint Scientific Commission for Antarctic Research (SCAR) and International Arctic Scientific Commission (IASC) open conference in St. Petersburg in July 2008. Opportunities like this will enable existing young scientists not just to talk to other scientists who might be doing similar research, but also advice on how to further their own careers.

Participation in science subjects both in schools and at universities in the UK is declining. Science taught in schools does not always seem relevant or interesting to young people, and against competition from subjects which are perceived as easier, science often loses out. This is the motivation behind getting young scientists to do more education and outreach work. One of the aims of the UKPN is to educate young people in schools not just about the science itself, but the opportunities that science affords. Not all researchers can go to Antarctica or spend months camped on an ice sheet and would not all want to either. However in a world that is increasingly reliant on science and technology, a degree in science opens doors, not just to careers in scientific research. The UKPN is planning school visits to coincide with National Science Week, and hopes that the links that young scientists make with schools will be beneficial not just to the schools but also to the researchers themselves.

The UK Polar Network outreach work doesn’t just include school visits. Some of the UK Polar Network committee recently attended the Explore conference, held by the Royal Geographical Society as panellists to share their knowledge of these regions with explorers and provide advice about doing fieldwork and expeditions in the polar regions, something that they have a lot of experience with themselves.

Research in extremes

At the UKPN Network days the conversation turns often from the research itself to how scientists conduct their research, and more specifically to field campaigns. If you want advice on what to wear to stay warm while drilling ice cores in Antarctica, or how to avoid travel sickness while flying 100ft above Arctic seas in an atmospheric research aircraft then look no further. Educating the next generation of polar scientists is high on the agenda of the organisers of IPY, and what better way to do this than to take young scientists on field campaigns and let them experience the polar regions first-hand. Apart from collecting valuable data which they can then analyse for their research, students learn how to do research in such extreme environments and return highly motivated.

The white continent. The scenery at Marguerite Bay, West Antarctic Peninsula. (Photo Courtesy Katherine Hendry, Oxford University)

Most polar scientists spend only a few weeks or a few months in the field collecting data, but for others it is their day job. One example is Tamsin Gray, a UK Polar Network member and British Antarctic Survey meteorologist whose current home is the Halley base on the Brunt ice shelf in Antarctica.

Gray’s work in Antarctica doesn’t just include releasing weather balloons and making meteorological observations.

“I get to spend days baking bread, driving bulldozers, digging snow to get water and abseiling down ice cliffs to visit the local colony of Emperor penguins,” Gray said.

Working in one of the most extreme environments on Earth is tough. Temperatures regularly fall below minus 40 degrees Celsius in the winter months when there is 24-hour darkness, and apart from a dozen or so other people on base, those cute little penguins are the only other living creatures for thousands of miles. Gray lists cold hands as one of the negative aspects of her job.

“In the Antarctic you have to go out and get on with your job whatever the weather, which sometimes mean working outside for long periods in extreme cold and darkness,” Gray said. “You learn the hard way to wrap up every last inch of bare skin.”

If you would like to find out more information about the UK Polar Network, including how to join, visit our new website. To find out about international activities, and find other national groups visit the APECS site.

A small disappointment comes in the closing chapter, An Alliance For Life, in which Wilson misses an opportunity to set aside differences and paint us a picture of what an allied Earth might resemble. Instead he lambastes the theory of Intelligent Design. Wilson claims that, “statured scientists…unanimously agree that the theory of Intelligent Design does not qualify as science.” Certainly, Wilson has rational and intuitive reasons for discrediting his own conception of Intelligent Design. Does he not see his life as a creative force through which beautiful work has been made with premeditated design? But scientific understanding of creativity and its role in unfolding the universal expansion is extremely limited-certainly too limited to dismiss intelligent design as a characteristic descriptor of the universe’s evolution. Other great scientists have been so mistaken; in the nineteenth century, Lord Kelvin and A.A. Michelson claimed all that remained for the physical sciences to discover was better precision.

Wilson closes The Creation by returning to his correspondence with the pastor, concluding that: “there remains the earthborn, yet transcendental, obligation we are both morally to share.” In fact, Wilson’s letter is not just to a Southern Baptist pastor, it is addressed to everyone. I highly recommend this thought-provoking read.

Paul Racette
Editor in Chief

With electricity supplies limited and mean temperature stuck below freezing for 8 months a year, it’s no surprise that in years past the Svalbard radar station on Spitsbergen Island in Arctic Norway ran just a few days at a time. The 32 and 42-meter parabolic dish antennas and transmitter, an incoherent scatter radar or ISR for short, would take a sequence of snapshots of the charged particles in the ionosphere 80-500 kilometers above Earth’s surface before shutting down again for a week or so. That rendered it blind to the ionosphere’s longer-range dynamics, much as “someone living in a windowless building who walked outside only at midday each day would be unaware that the sun set below the horizon at night,” notes Tony van Eyken, director of EISCAT (for European Incoherent SCATter), the international operation that owns the Svalbard ISR.

Until March 1, 2007, that is. On that day, at 1700 UT, Svalbard began scanning the ionosphere round-the-clock to produce what van Eyken calls, “the most detailed and extensive record of the high latitude ionosphere ever recorded.” Within months the resulting dataset was already testing the best models of how the Sun, the Earth’s geomagnetic field and other influences impinge on the ionosphere and how the ionosphere, in turn, affects Earth’s climate. On February 29, 2008 the ISR will scale its continuous operation back to a biweekly scanning schedule that should continue to pick up long term variations that the earlier operations could not have seen.

The launch of Svalbard’s unprecedented run marked the start of International Polar Year (IPY). But it is just one of hundreds of projects pushing the bounds of science thanks to three such ‘international science years’ that got underway in 2007: IPY and International Heliophysical Year (which, in spite of their names, run for two years), and the 1.5-year long Electronic Geophysical Year. All three seek to extend the legacy of 1st and 2nd International Polar Year (125 and 75 years ago) and the 1st International Geophysical Year (50 years ago). These global extravaganzas reaffirmed international cooperation in science, inspired the treaty protecting Antarctica for peaceful uses and research, and made startling discoveries.

WHAT’S IN A YEAR FOR SCIENCE?

Svalbard’s run highlights the overlapping missions of the larger IPY effort and that of the heliosphysical and electronic geophysical years. Anyone lucky enough to have witnessed the auroras streaming down into the Earth’s polar regions can grasp the special connection between the poles and the heliosphere, which is the magnetic zone containing our solar system, the charged particles known as the solar wind, and the Sun’s magnetic field. The auroras are visual evidence that energetic solar particles penetrate Earth’s protective magnetic bubble at the poles. The objective of International Heliospherical Year (IHY) is to discover how such phenomena are coupled to the Earth and its climate.

Electronic Geophysical Year (eGY), meanwhile, seeks to make geophysical data as ‘open access’ as possible. That is an ideal heartily embraced by many IPY and IHY projects such as the Svalbard radar run which are producing virtual observatories to ensure that their observations will be studied as widely and as effectively as possible.

The practical impact of these science years is to inspire the extra funding and collaboration needed to understand highly complex and dynamic properties of the Earth. Svalbard’s project was approved for inclusion in the international science years as part of a broader program called Heliosphere Impact on Geospace, which includes another 28 international research projects led by scientists in Australia, Brazil, Canada, China, Finland, Italy, Japan, Malaysia, Norway, Russia, Sweden, U.K., Ukraine, and the U.S.

Inclusion in the science years often translates into expanded government funding for observational equipment. The UAMPY project coordinated by Professor Lucilla Alfonsi at the Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia in Rome is collaborating with another IPY called POLENET to build a dense network of Antarctic GPS-receivers. POLENET will use the GPS for meteorology, glaciology and seismology, while UAMPY will use them to model steep electron gradients in the ionosphere that cause scintillations in the GPS radio signals as they pass through, modeling that may ultimately improve the reliability of GPS.

In other cases science year funding and collaboration greases the gears to enable unprecedented coordination of existing observing instruments, be they on the ground, in the air or on satellites. Take the POGHEX project led by John Cooper, chief scientist at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center’s Space Physics Data Facility. POGHEX is using observational ‘campaigns’ to investigate the flow of cosmic ray energy from within the heliosphere, the Sun, and beyond. To cover this immense region the project is integrating observations by spacecraft, including the Voyager spacecraft now probing the outer reaches of the heliosphere, and from a circumpolar Antarctic flight of high-altitude balloons in December. (These balloons are better known to Earth observers as Balloon-borne Experiments with a Superconducting Spectrometer or BESS.)

These synchronized images of auroras by satellites over Earth’s north and south poles, assembled by a Norwegian/U.S. project called ICESTAR, show that events at one pole are not always mirrored at the other. In the event shown, the aurora rising up from the South Pole appears to displace brightening in the north. (Photo Courtesy Nicolai Østgaard)

The power of dataset integrations such as POGHEX was demonstrated recently by a U.S./Norwegian team involved in another Heliosphere Impact project called ICESTAR examining the coupling between the auroras in the North and South hemispheres. “This is about how energy flows into our system,” says Nicolai Østgaard, an expert in space physics at the University of Bergen. Until now most models have assumed that equal energy flows in to both polls and thus the events at one are mirrored at the other, essentially ignoring the tilt of the Earth which can put the poles at different angles from the sun. Østgaard and his colleagues showed that was a dangerous assumption in research published last year in the Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics.

Østgaard’s team used simultaneous imaging by satellites above each pole, IMAGE and Polar at the Arctic and Antarctic, respectively, to demonstrate that this is a greater simplification than scientists have realized. They observed some phenomena, such as the theta aurora that stretch a luminous belt across the polar cap, occurring independently in one hemisphere as well as events where brightening in one hemisphere, such as the onset of a solar-induced substorm, displaced the brightening in the opposing hemisphere. In some cases the quantitative divergence from current models was as high as ten-fold. “Without funding from IPY we would not have been able to do this,” says Østgaard.

SETTING THE SIGHTS HIGH

The Svalbard ISR radar run is a subproject within ICESTAR combining campaign-level coordination of observatories and better use of existing equipment. Extra funding was required to provide continuous operation of the Svalbard ISR, the project’s backbone, which is no easy task inside the Arctic Circle. “Operating one of these radars in this way is a major undertaking and a dramatic change,” says van Eyken. “Prior to the IPY, the longest runs ever were little more than a month.”

Van Eyken says that once it became clear that Svalbard would run flat out for a year, ISR teams around the pole jumped in to support the effort. Radars at Millstone Hill near Boston and Sondrestromfjord in Greenland are making coordinated observations every two weeks, the Russian Radar at Irkutsk in Siberia plans to make four month-long observations, and a newly-installed ISR in Alaska is trying to match Svalbard’s round-the-clock operation. Van Eyken says the project is going very well so far: “All the radars have substantially achieved their targets, the data processing is up to date, and the results are freely distributed via the web.”

Anthony van Eyken, the man behind the machines at the Svalbard radar on Spitsbergen Island in Arctic Norway, carries a rifle for protection from roaming polar bears, just one of many challenges to the remote station’s historic 2-year run. (Photo Courtesy Cesar La Hoz)

The greatest challenge to date for van Eyken has been glitches at the local coal-fired power plant (the only one in Norway) which feeds the ISR, the local village, and nearby mining operations, including the mines that supply coal to the station. “The radar accounts for a substantial fraction of the total load on the power station and technical problems there have meant that there has not always been enough power to run the radar and the village,” says van Eyken.

And the results? The ISR data shows that both the density and altitude of ionization in the upper atmosphere are very low, well beyond the levels that models would predict, even for the cyclical period of relatively low solar storm activity we are currently experiencing (known as a solar minimum). Van Eyken speculates that this may be the signature of cooling in the upper atmosphere, a link that has yet to be proven. “Such effects are predicted to occur with increases in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere but it is yet to be demonstrated that the two effects are actually related,” says van Eyken.

SHARING THE WEALTH

Researchers say the datasets pouring out of the science years are already stimulating friendly scientific dueling as modelers take the early data, feed it to their models, and generate predictions for future atmospheric developments that are tested against the incoming data. The results of one “ionosphere-thermosphere challenge” based on the continuous ISR data are posted on a wiki set up by Jan Sojka, a physicist at Utah State University. Van Eyken says such intense model-testing is an important step towards forecasting, which he calls “essential” to the ability to “handle the effects of space weather on our increasingly technologically dependent society.”

Van Eyken and the ISR community also exemplify another goal of IPY and IHY and the explicit function of eGY: encouraging open access to scientific data. One approach to this is creation of ‘virtual observatories’ which bring together disparate but related data sources. Generally they include systems to retrieve data, handle any format conversions required, and then provide a user interface to ease browsing or heavy-duty data-mining of the datasets. In the ISR case, John Holt, a principal scientist on the Millstone Hill ISR, is leading development of a virtual observatory called Madrigal to pull together the ISR observations.

Other virtual observatories emerging from this community include the Virtual Global Magnetic Observatory housed on University of Michigan servers (Vladimir Papitashvili from Michigan is on the IPY’s Data Management subcommittee), the University of Calgary-operated GAIA Virtual Observatory which provides access to 10 million summary images and keograms from all sky imagers, meridional scanning photometers, riometers, and satellite borne global imagers from a number of international sources, and the Virtual Cosmic Ray Observatory (ViCRO) proposed by NASA’s John Cooper to manage data from POGHEX and related experiments.

These observatories should ensure that the legacy of the three science years that got started last year will continue to grow for many years to come.

IEEE’s involvement in such an end-to-end effort as GEOSS should not come as a surprise. Engineering and world progress are intimately connected, reaching back to the times of Greece and before. Whether it is the water in the Roman aqueducts or the cables and radio links that bring the internet and its communications to any point on the globe, engineers use their talents to address key issues and advancements for society.

The core purpose of IEEE is to foster technological innovation and excellence for the benefit of humanity. Implied in this benefit is the recognition of the importance to maintain healthy symbiotic relationship with Earth’s species and environment. For these reasons, volunteers from IEEE are making vital contributions to GEOSS. GEOSS is an information source, and supporting its implementation and operation is a key example of how our engineers are devoted to addressing some of the world’s great problems.

IEEE involvement in the GEO process has already shown important results. Our members constitute one of the core groups within GEO fostering development of interoperability among GEOSS components. For GEOSS, interoperability means the ability to translate among system languages and ultimately to a natural language that everyone can understand – it could be called creating an Earth information “Rosetta Stone.” The result is giving those who are not necessarily technically trained the tools for informed decision making. IEEE is an ideal participant for this activity, based on its world-renowned reputation as a standards organization, its transnational character and its broad range of engineering skills, especially in the area of information technology.

Our organization is committed to support GEO and its goal to develop this important global information base for both decision makers and individuals. But our commitment stems from an element more important than any organizational decision: it is the result of our passion for connecting engineering with Society’s well being. This is an interest in all things constructive, and an important means of finding one’s balance in life. It’s engineering for humanity.

Leah Jamieson, 2007 President, IEEE

I discovered Hoyle’s prognosis circa 1964 when I was doing research for my assignment as US Navy technical liaison to the ill-fated Manned Orbiting Laboratory program planned by the Department of Defense. Those words registered strongly with me at the time, although neither the newly named NASA nor the DOD promoted space flight for its impact upon human esoteric sensibilities. Far more prosaic objectives were the driving force behind the initial conquest of space, namely political, technical and military dominance of this new frontier.

It was not until the flight of Apollo 8, in December, 1968, that we humans were first able to observe our home planet from afar, and to make a photographic record for all to see, thereby testing Hoyle’s conjecture. Since that day, not a day has passed in major cities of the world without the electronic and print media prominently displaying pictures of Earth from deep space. Particularly appealing are the magnificent full Earth images, from Apollo 17 with the spacecraft positioned directly between Earth and Sun. Although all Apollo crews were captivated by the view from deep space of Earth in its heavenly setting and each crew in turn made their own photographs of the view, only rarely was the spacecraft position such that a view of the fully illuminated Earth was available at near lunar distances.

What is the mystique that causes these pictures to be so continuously appealing? I believe it is the fact of suddenly seeing ourselves as part of the larger picture of creation, and feeling a deep yearning to understand better our relationship to the cosmos. Our wanting answers to questions of origins, purpose and destiny. Surely ancient humans looked into the star filled sky, marveled and wondered at the view, and tried to fathom the meaning. But only in our time have we had the privilege of going out, looking back and seeing the larger picture of our Home Planet in its setting as a tiny haven of life, in a rather average solar system, far out on the spiral arm of a rather mundane galaxy, which is just one similar to billions of others that we can now see with modern telescopes. Even the most advanced science of yesteryear did not give clue to the amazing discoveries that powerful telescopic and photographic technology would provide following the first years of the space age.

Many thousands of years ago primitive man set out on foot and inhabited most of Earth’s land masses. Later, the ancient Phoenicians in their frail craft began exploring the Mediterranean Sea, and the South Sea Islanders in dugout canoes navigated between islands of the vast Pacific. In more recent times our fathers learned to conquer the air above us and the depths of the oceans, and now our generation has developed the capability to challenge the heavens and to extend human presence into our solar system and perhaps even beyond. It seems our destiny is exploration and expansion. And we must. Current knowledge of the stars and their processes cause us to believe that our solar system is about five billion years old and roughly half way through its life cycle. Thus for our species to survive, we must have left this planet before our sun burns out its fuel. But actually, the need to understand our destiny is more immediate.

Buckminster Fuller, a great visionary and inventor of our time, noted in the earliest days of space flight, that: “We are the crew of Spaceship Earth, but we are a crew in mutiny.” And asks: “How do you manage a spacecraft with a mutinous crew?” Those of us who have had the privilege of observing our Home Planet from afar all marvel at the beauty, the peace, the serenity that comes with seeing Earth in its setting among the stars. The boundaries that divide us into different cultures with different ideas, rules and values are not visible. Although we spacefarers may express our feeling of the experience in slightly different ways, the essence is the same: exhilaration at the magnificence and majesty of our Home Planet in its place among the stars. This experience has been noted and written about. It is called the “Overview Effect” and is likely to become a major attraction as space flight becomes more common and available to the public.

However, we are indeed a crew in seeming mutiny and damaging the basic natural infrastructure of the planet that gives us life. The exponential increase in every measure relating to human activity such as population growth, dwindling fresh water supply, ecosystem destruction, species extinction and depletion of other nonrenewable resources threatens the future of all life on the planet. Add to those concerns our human propensity to continue accepting violence, particularly warfare between cultures and nations as a proper means of conflict resolution. This does not bode well for human civilization as it puts us on an unsustainable course into the future.

Both Hoyle and Fuller were correct in their assessment. When we see our Earth from deep space, it appears as a magnificent haven of life and beauty that inspires the deepest sense of appreciation, oneness with the cosmos and the joy of living. It has provided we humans the means to achieve our dreams and to create our destiny even beyond the lifetime of our solar system. But beneath that thin layer of life giving atmosphere we are a crew of Spaceship Earth largely unmindful that the violence we perpetrate upon each other and upon the structure of the ecosystem which gives us sustenance also threatens our very existence. Only by seeing the larger picture of ourselves as an integral part in the movement of the cosmos through space and time and understanding that he have a deep responsibility to the future of our planet and its species to insure survival, can we begin to reverse the unsustainable path that we have chosen.

Editorial Comment: The above article is by a man who knows, better than most, what it means to have a global perspective. Dr. Edgar Mitchell is the sixth man to walk on the moon, one of only a dozen men who have ever experienced the view of Earth from the surface of its companion body. After retiring from the astronaut core, Dr. Mitchell went on to found the Institute of Noetic Sciences, an organization with 30,000+ members dedicated to seeking a deeper understanding of the ways of “inner knowing” and transforming the world condition into one of freedom, wisdom and love.

The hat collection overtaking his corner office two blocks from the White House says much of Conrad Lautenbacher’s interests. The caps are mementos of a decorated 40-year Navy career and also from his current job, where part of it is running oceanographic and fisheries vessels, including underwater robots.
He is chief of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Agency, overseeing a $4 billion annual operation of satellites, ships, and in situ sensors on balloons and buoys that, analyzed in its national centers, improve prediction of daily weather, seasonal hurricanes, and long-term climate cycles, among other things.
Not long after joining NOAA in 2001, Vice Admiral Lautenbacher began working with other nations to attempt a comprehensive, coordinated and sustained observation of the Earth. The effort has come to be known as the Global Earth Observation System of Systems. There is no boss of GEOSS, but he is a founder and one of its four international co-chairs. He sat down with Earthzine contributor John Adam in early September to talk about some of the challenges.

Earthzine: How does your 40 years with the Navy, a lot of it on borderless blue ocean, affect management of NOAA, a rather far flung civilian agency?

Lautenbacher: It’s a very important background for me. Obviously this is not a military organization. Our operations are open. But we need to have the same kind of coordination skills. The success of America is that we are able to manage large projects. Not that I claim I’m the best manager in the world, but I have experience with large operations. You need to treat the Earth as something connected. The global ecosytem doesn’t fit within political boundaries or even the physical boundaries between land and sea and air. Everything is coupled. And if you don’t view it as a total system, or system of systems, you will miss a great deal.

Earthzine: With regard to the observation system, GEOSS, how would you describe it, Version 5.0 perhaps?

Lautenbacher: [Laughs.] I don’t think of it that way. Global observations have been a fact of life for a long, long time. The question is: Are we doing it comprehensively, organized in a way that can contribute to understanding our Earth, understanding the physics, the biology, the chemistry? Are we then able put together the facts and information that can be provided to citizens as well as policy makers to make decisions. And that’s not happened. We are not there yet. We’ve been doing it piecemeal. Individual countries have satellites. Individual countries have buoys in the waters that detect salinity, temperature, wave action, currents and related information.
Until the last decade, we haven’t really had the framework to bring nations and organizations together in some coherent way to share data. We call it GEOSS – that’s an internationally negotiated term. It’s a tough job negotiating agreements among 30 or 70 or 180 nations. We have had individual systems for a long time. The United States has a number of satellites, and Europe too. Some of the developing countries have weather observation systems. The real key is the System of Systems. It’s getting that other “S” into this game. And then you get to your 1.0, 2.0, 3.0 or whatever version. It’s too early to talk in those terms. We need basic agreements on coverage, data sharing and use of information. These agreements are more difficult than the technical issues. I think you could produce Version 5.0 instantaneously if everybody agreed to share data and set up common the protocols. The human and the political dimensions are the most difficult.

Earthzine: How is the U.S. addressing this political challenge?

Lautenbacher: The United States supports science for public good. We buy satellites and provide information for free. The business model that we have for data availability in the U.S. is one we believe is worthwhile sharing with the world. We should exchange information worldwide and ensure it is coherent, accurate, validated, and complete. Generally, scientists and politicians have access only to individual studies, to three months of data in the Arctic, or measurements of carbon in the ocean over a period of a few months. But to obtain carbon measurements around the entire globe in a definable way, and to understand how carbon is moves around the Earth would be a great achievement. It is extraordinarily important if we’re going to get a handle on climate change. Today we don’t have a comprehensive global carbon measuring system. It’s just not there.

Earthzine: The confluence of space and information technology enables a full carbon measurement to be attempted. What was the catalyst for this program, had you been thinking of this before NOAA?

Lautenbacher: Before NOAA, I was at CORE (Consortium for Oceanographic Research and Education). The oceanography community has been interested in this for a long time. I’ve been very interested in the progress of a global ocean observing system which could support a comprehensive measurement system. It’s been very slow starting. It’s hard. It’s expensive. The ocean is basically opaque to satellites.
Yet, the ocean is hugely important for climate, weather, navigation, transportation, energy. And then you consider other human dimensions. What is it that we can do to bring the world to an economic standard that we can be proud of? The opportunity is there. I understood this participating in a three-hour conference presentation in Africa. There were county managers, city managers, people from 11 African countries or so who had to wrestle with basic life giving requirements. For three hours, they gave a tribute to geographic information systems (GIS) populated with satellite and in situ data. With help from GIS-based information, they knew where to drill wells. They knew where not to put roads–kinds of things that the developed world takes for granted. It allowed them to leapfrog forward. I realized the potential is enormous.
We have precedents such as CEOS, the organization that cooperates on earth observing satellites, and the World Meteorological Association, which shares weather data. Why not get more of these systems together so we can really build a complete and coherent information base, and expand these “GIS” layers. GEOSS is not just for physical sciences. Let’s get medical, health, environment, biological, fisheries, and agricultural interests to contribute GIS layers and build a truly comprehensive Earth System of Systems. We would have a very powerful tool for nations and for average citizens to improve their lot. I’m not claiming any credit for the idea. People have been talking about this for 30 years, since the beginning of the satellites age. What is happening today is the confluence of observing technology and information technology. The Internet is penetrating everywhere. You have a great thirst and hunger for information. Why not try to harness it in a logical, efficient way?
Scores of nations have signed up, and a large number of UN groups have joined We can begin to start to correlate multidisciplinary conditions which can get at questions such as how does bird flu get transmitted? The solution requires large, worldwide databases that have transparency. If you can tell in advance where a disease originates and where it is going, you will be better able to contain it.

Earthzine: How do you reconcile recent published reports, Executive Branch optimism on one hand; on the other, outcries from the National Research Council decadal survey over cuts, such as at NASA’s Earth sciences?

Lautenbacher: There is always a battle for resources. No everyone will always agree on the same priorities. Money is required. There needs to be technical agreement. Scientists are always eager for more information. But can the technology be developed at a reasonable cost? What is it that the nation can afford? What are the priorities that we should put on advancing the state of the science? These are very important questions. We are moving forward. If you look at our ability to observe our earth, it’s on an uptrend. It’s going to continue on an uptrend. I think the various bends in the curve are not that critical. While we do need to work on them, I don’t see them as being a major impediment to building a system of systems. The United States contributes a lion’s share to earth observing at this point. We have something like 58 satellites observing the earth. Lulls in the action have only been temporary.

Earthzine: How would you characterize the human impact on the planet?

Lautenbacher: Humans have a huge impact on the earth. We’re in a race to figure out how to deal with it. We need a complete system, with information coming out in a form that people can use, rather than a table of raw radiances coming from a satellite. We need information they people can look at and utilize to determine whether certain decisions should be made. Using the term ‘observation system’ takes it out of the political realm. I don’t think anybody can argue about having observations. It is basic to the scientific method. We are a science-based society. You start with observations. You need facts, and these must be validated by ground truth.

Earthzine: And what about economic pressures where clean emissions are seen as a luxury?

Lautenbacher: Part of the problem is that nations vary in terms of economic development and protection of the environment. Yet I believe they are connected. The economy and the environment are inextricably connected. We don’t have very good methods to evaluate all the factors, total costs and impacts. That makes it difficult so there is a tendency to ignore them. It is human nature. But we need to figure out what comprises the total costs. Having such basic information will help build the foundation for sensible development. Providing technology for cleaner coal emissions is a reasonable step to take.

Earthzine: How can you get important information to the public and decision makers? In one of your talks, you mentioned NOAA is a popular trafficked government web site.

Lautenbacher: It usually ranks second or third. We experience greatest usage during hurricane season. People are very interested in catastrophic weather. We get enormous hits when we put out a new rule for fishing. It’s a pretty broad distribution.
I see climate forecasts as a big issue. We put out one each season. We need to build climate services the same way we build weather services. In that way a farmer in Wyoming, for example, can look ahead at five-year predictions of the snow pack and consider the need to stockpile water.

Earthzine: Is there some concern that people in industry might see this as a basis for increased regulation?

Lautenbacher: That is a possibility. Yet sometimes industry likes regulation. It just depends on the problem you are trying to solve. A total free-for-all generally is not in everybody’s best interest. You can’t just have Dodge City out there. If you are going to invest in resources for the next 10 years, it is important to know what is going to happen. Usually every party has some interest in having a structure. The aim is to achieve a win/win situation. For example, oil companies with rigs in the Gulf saw the value of sharing non-proprietary information through the government. The data from rigs allow better forecasts of Gulf currents for their use and better hurricane predictions for the public. The result benefits everyone.

Earthzine: What about military intelligence suspicions if the system gets too intrusive?

Lautenbacher: This is a civilian domestic system. It is not meant to challenge or get into any national security issues. We are developing the system for the common good. I believe that as we move to more varied multi-level security systems, in which systems provide information to multiple users– defense as well as industry, civil populations and government officials– there will be certain levels of open observations and information that the world will tolerate and certain levels that each country will tolerate. We should try to press the envelope from the domestic side because, in essence, economies are hooked together today. If we don’t work together, it will be difficult to produce a sustainable future

Earthzine: Is the commitment commensurate with the endeavor yet?

Lautenbacher: The jury is out. Despite tough budgets with the war in Iraq, the President has asked for increases in NOAA’s budget each year. The decadal study questions how we can continue advances created by what might be called a one-time shot at earth observing in the early 90s. NASA does research. NOAA tries to build continuously monitoring resources that we need every day. This transition to operations generally costs more, in terms of reliability, data ingestion, etc. Should more dollars be put into NASA? Should it change priority? I don’t know what the answers are. We are in the intermediate chapters. The last chapters haven’t been written yet.

Earthzine: How do you measure success?

Lautenbacher: A little bit at a time. Success was getting 30 nations to come to Washington to even talk about this. Success was getting nations to agree on a 10-year plan. Success was getting a number of nations to agree to GEONETCast so that with simple computers and a dish information can be sent to all nations of the world. I don’t view our work as ever being completed. This is not something that will stop. This is the answer to the Malthusian prophecies that everybody is going to starve because we don’t know what we are doing. The next step of science is to guide how we will be able to co-exist on our planet. If human beings are going to go on forever, we’re going to need to engage in this pursuit continuously.

Earthzine.org is a resource for the international Earth-observing community and an arm for vitally-needed public outreach by providing information on the science and technology underlying Earth observations, and utilizing Earth information. The on-line publication is updated regularly with news from around the world about the Earth, Earth observations, environmental policy, and new and emerging environmentally-friendly and earth-observing technologies. We plan to develop and maintain comprehensive educational materials that are informative to the professional and accessible to the general public. Our goal is to publish materials that are inspirational to new and future Earth observers and promote greater awareness of the Earth through its observation. Using the latest web technologies, the site fosters interaction of an on-line community of Earth observers. Earthzine.org serves as a repository of professional and amateur observations from around the world through features such as an on-line poster session where community members can “hang” their posters and distribute copies of their publications. Overlaying these resources are quarterly publications of articles centered on themes relevant to the nine societal benefit areas identified by GEOSS. The first three quarterly themes are Earth Observations: A Global Perspective, International Polar Year, and Sub-Saharan Drought.

Currently, the Earthzine staff is in the process of developing the site’s infrastructure and establishing a repository of site content. We invite you to be part of this effort by joining the Earth-observing community. There are many ways in which you may participate and contribute. The easiest way is to sign in and share your comments about what you observe, upload samples of your work for others to see and comment on other’s work. If you would like to make a more sustained contribution, volunteer to be an editor, write an article, and invite others to participate. The Earthzine volunteers and I look forward to hearing from you.

Paul Racette
Editor-In-Chief

When it was suggested to me by Cleon Anderson, the 2005 President of the IEEE, to read “The World is Flat” by Thomas Friedman, my initial reaction was to think that I had already heard all that I needed to know about globalization. Fortunately, my curiosity and Cleon’s insistence got the better of me, and I bought the book at the outset of a trip from Denver to New Delhi. I couldn’t put it down for nearly the entire flight. I now readily concede relearning from Friedman’s book a great deal of what I thought I knew about the impending global techno-economic changes that lie ahead. “The World is Flat” is an important contribution to global social trend analysis in the early 21st century, and should be required reading for any technologically minded person living in the relative comfort of a first-world economy.

Building upon over a year of research into the economically exploding once-backwaters of India and China, Friedman relates in plain terms the degree to which telecommunications, political stability, and the relentless pursuit of a better lifestyle are creating previously unheard of opportunity in some of the most densely populated and heretofore underdeveloped cities in the world. Global investments in Mumbai, Hyderabad, Bangalore, Shanghai, and Beijing, along with outsourcing of “back room” information processing tasks and virtually all forms of manufacturing from the developed countries – specifically the U.S. and countries within Western Europe – have given rise to a historically unprecedented boom in building construction, employment, and migration from the surrounding rural areas. These information and manufacturing juggernauts continue to grab millions of moderate-wage jobs from the developed nations yet at the same time keep global inflation in check by providing low-cost services and goods. Flatness has also had its negative consequences, including the rise of loose-knit global organizations bent on destruction, for example, Al Qaida. It has also hastened environmental exploitation as the newly empowered populations vie for natural resources, especially building materials and fuel.

When will these techno-economic trends diminish? According to Friedman, they’ve only just begun. We live in an age when literally billions of impoverished people are becoming empowered as a result of the availability of cellular phones, the internet, cheap bandwidth, and the educational opportunities provided by many high-quality universities. Contrary to prevailing first-world attitudes, engineering seems to be the degree of choice for the many young upwardly mobile Indians and Chinese who are striving to live well and prosper. Do they know something that we in the first world might have forgotten?

Overall, I have to agree with Friedman that a flatter world is preferable to one with artificial socioeconomic barriers, and hope that we will continue to make decisions that engender flatness. On my way to Delhi a well-dressed info-tech savvy young Indian man with more than a few frequent flyer miles said to me “What a funny title for a book. The world isn’t flat!? I replied, “Oh yes it is – and you should thank your lucky stars.?